The PPP is not the first political party in Guyana

Dear Editor,
I refer to Mr Hydar Ally’s letter which was published in Stabroek News on Monday, June 5, under the caption, ‘The split in the PPP’. It is unfortunate that the letter provided no new insight into this important national political event that took place in 1953. However, notwithstanding its shortcomings there are issues Mr Ally addressed in the letter that still require clarification. It is my humble opinion that the Guyanese people are still suffering from this event that has so negatively impacted the nation.
Mr Ally’s letter seems to be motivated to a large degree by (a) the desire to glorify his party, the PPP; and (b) to provide political information to the public, particularly the younger generation of Guyanese. It is my view that Mr Ally is within his right and should enjoy the greatest latitude in his attempts at glorification of his party. However, in the matter of the dissemination of political information I hold strongly to the view that public education requires objectivity and clarity. It is on this score I invite Mr Hydar Ally to be more helpful.
In his letter Ally wrote, “ …The PPP was formed on January 1, 1950 which makes the party the oldest political party in Guyana and among the oldest in the Commonwealth Caribbean”. Given the way the historic political narrative has unfolded and the PPP’s propaganda since the ʼ50s, the average Guyanese has the erroneous view that the PPP was the first political party in the country. While Mr Ally did not say so explicitly and, since I have respectfully attributed to him the noble intention of educating the public and more so the younger generation, on our political history, I hope he will reciprocate by responding to the following questions I now pose to him:. (1) Is he saying that the PPP is the oldest surviving party in Guyana? or (2) is he implying that the PPP was the first political party in Guyana?
My knowledge of developments on the political landscape in Guyana informs me that the PPP is not the first political party in the country, neither is it the first party to sweep the pools (landside electoral victory) nor is it the first to be neutralized/robbed of electoral victory by the British colonial power. The claim to that position belongs to the little known Popular Party (PP) which in the 1926 elections won 12 of the 14 seats up for grabs. This success was determined by the colonial powers to be unacceptable, and measures were taken to ensure that the party did not exercise political power based on its victory. The British ensured that through the courts the Popular Party lost 5 seats on the grounds of technicalities.
In keeping with the need for public political education I refer here to another issue raised in Ally’s letter. He mentioned a recommendation made by the Robertson Commission and pointed out that it called for the, “communists and hardliners” in the PPP to be removed and the “moderate” elements be put in control of the party. In the latter part of his letter Mr Ally stated, “… Suffice it to say that both the British and American administrations badly miscalculated in their assessment and characterization of Dr Jagan and the PPP in terms of ideological orientation and political philosophy.” The obvious question for Mr Hydar Ally to answer is this: Was Dr Jagan at the time of the incident at reference a Marxist/Leninist and a Communist?
Yours faithfully,
Tacuma Ogunseye
guyana chronicle

What s the 4 p,s

Dear Editor,
I am not in the habit of responding to letters in the media but after reading Mr Tacuma Ogunseye’s letter (‘The PPP is not the first political party in Guyana’ Stabroek News, June I felt obligated to provide some clarification on a few observations made by him.
Firstly, I did not state in my letter that the PPP is the oldest political party in Guyana. There was, as he quite correctly observed, the Labour Party of the 1930s which by the late 1950s had lost much of its militancy and appeal due mainly to the opportunism of several of its leaders. That party had won six of the fourteen seats in the Legislative Assembly but on most issues it sided with the planter-dominated legislature. As Dr Jagan noted in his book The West on Trial the party was Labour only in name.
The PPP of the 1950s represented the most broad-based and labour-oriented party that emerged during the colonial era and which has survived until today. This obviously makes the party the oldest and, I wish to add, the largest political party today, despite the several attempts to split the PPP and emasculate its leadership.
I stand by my views that both the British and the United States administrations miscalculated in their assessment and categorization of Dr Jagan and the PPP during the 1960s when they engineered the removal of the PPP from political office. And while there was no doubt regarding Dr Jagan’s leftist and “communist” leanings, the fact remained that the PPP at no time, whether in or out of office, ever advocated a Soviet-model of political or economic development. In fact, the party had always embraced political and ideological pluralism, multi-party democracy, a trisectoral economy with a dominant role for the private sector which was deemed by Dr Jagan as the “engine of growth”.
Dr Jagan’s brand of “communism” was fundamentally different from what was practised in the Soviet Union and other Eastern bloc countries. It took into account the peculiar political and cultural realities of Guyana and the wider Caribbean with one overarching objective, namely, to create a socially just society buttressed by free and fair multi-party elections, good governance and the rule of law.
Yours faithfully,
Hydar Ally