For several months in 2023, there were persistent calls by peripheral forces for the PNCR to convene its Biennial Congress by December of that year. They demanded that the issue be taken to the Central Executive Committee, which deferred the matter to the General Council. At the General Council, the Party Leader declared that the Congress would be convened before August 31, 2024. The Party was on notice, the groups were on notice, and all aspirants were on notice. However, the calls for Congress to be held in December 2023 continued, even in early December.
On April 24, 2024, the Central Executive Committee established a congress committee and tasked the committee with developing a proposal for the convening of Congress, including the identification of a date. The Congress Committee submitted its report on May 15, 2024, and proposed that the Congress be held on June 28-30, 2024. The Central Executive Committee ratified the recommendations.
Immediately after the congress date was announced publicly, a number of people, including some who in December were calling for Congress by December 31, began complaining that the notice was too short. Some claimed the groups did not have enough time, and others declared that candidates did not have enough time to get to know the membership. Now, Mark Archer, former PR officer of the former Leader, David Granger, joined the bandwagon with a letter published in Kaieteur News on June 19, 2024, claiming that no Party Congress was ever organized with such short notice. All reasons proffered against a June 28-30 Congress are frivolous.
Mark Archer’s letter is several weeks late, and the points raised therein must be summarily dismissed. This letter might have been relevant five weeks ago when questions about the party’s ability to meet the timelines would have required answers. However, in its planning, the Congress Committee created a meticulous schedule detailed on a dynamic Gantt chart. Today, less than two weeks before the Congress, all schedule timelines have been met. Groups have submitted their nominations and lists of delegates, and are conscientiously working to secure their congress purse. Accommodation and transportation for delegates from outlying regions are in place. The Congress venue is ready, and food for all delegates is in place. Mark Archer’s concern about the Party’s inability to complete detailed and complex preparations for holding the Congress is not only late, it is misplaced and is raised with a nefarious agenda.
Further, Archer’s assertion that the PNCR never convened a Congress with shorter notice is false, and one must wonder if it is a deliberate attempt to mislead. When former Party Leader Hugh Desmond Hoyte died on December 22, 2002, he was buried on December 30, and on January 5, 2003, it was announced that a Special Congress would be held on February 1, 2003, to elect a new Leader. The party successfully completed the detailed and complex preparations needed and convened a well-organized congress. Surely, Archer is not suggesting he forgot this.
Archer might also remember that when the Founder Leader died on August 6, 1985, a Congress was scheduled for later that same month. The PNCR, like the great party it is, mourned its Leader but proceeded with the convening of the Congress. I question people who, on one hand, shout “ours is a great party,” yet at the same time question the Party’s ability to manage tasks it has accomplished on several occasions before, just because it is on an accelerated schedule.
The vigorous campaign calling for the holding of Congress, and the criticisms now that Congress has been scheduled, is nothing but an organized effort to manipulate the public. The 80% nomination for the Party Leader is a clear indication that the Party’s members were not fooled by the smoke and mirrors. They saw the truth behind the illusion the detractors were trying to create.