The new PNC leader?
THE RICKEY SINGH COLUMN
DESMOND Hoyte is the most enigmatic of the six executive presidents who have governed this country. Even inside the PNC, Hoyte was an introvert, relating only to Burnham, and seldom getting personal with the party machine. When he became president, Hoyte never broke with his pristine political self. His period of power was characterised by contradictions; forward and backward movement at the same time; moments of glasnost, moments of authoritarian consolidation. Under Hoyte's stewardship from 1985 to 1992, if anything was in constant motion, it was the pendulum. But few can deny his existential bravery. He de-Burnhamised society and the economy, and laid the groundwork for social revitalisation. His critics have been poignant in denying him a historical niche. Their arguments are: he had no room for manoeuvre because the West locked him in a game of `Catch 22'; that the world was going in the direction of abertura, glasnost and perestroika, and he got swept along in a historical inevitability leaving little space for political manipulation. One biting aspersion cast on his rule was that it was more of colour than substance. For example, corruption was never exorcised, and the African masses got nothing for their support for his regime after Burnham's death. More research will have to be done on his time as president, but in arriving at judgement, it is difficult not to see a large part of the evidence attributing positive social gains to him. The Desmond Hoyte we know now has been damaged by his politics since 1997. I believe if he had retired after the 1992 defeat, no ingenious analyst could have undermined that historical niche. He should have called it a day, sought funding for his memoirs and instigated the University of Guyana to offer a scholarship in his name in the study of politics. I suspect that among people who didn't care for him and the PNC, there would have been a lasting respect. Wherever you go in Guyana, wherever you reflect on this country, his name comes up as someone who brought Guyana out of a vortex of death. Personally speaking, as an analyst, I would certainly be uncomfortable denying his place in Guyanese history. But if anyone is doing that, it is Hoyte himself. The political strategy used in opposing his political antagonists, the PPP, since 1997, has been horrible, morally unacceptable, politically self-destructive, and nationally calamitous. In opposition, Hoyte has remained his pristine self. And that may have been one of several factors leading to the evolution of PNC's post 97 politics. In a fragile economy, and a brittle polity punctuated with a ubiquitous Freudian psychology, Hoyte's confrontationist obsession had to send the country down, but in the process it has lacerated the image of the man who brought the country out of Burnham's grip. Can any type of political surgery obliterate the scar? The answer is yes. In his final period as PNC leader, Hoyte may come good, redeem himself, and do something for Guyana. That something will be his choice for his replacement. The front-runners are Vincent Alexander, Aubrey Norton, and strong dark-horse, Robert Corbin. A few political watchers talk about Winston Murray. But the PNC is not ready for an Indian leader, and Murray himself doesn't look as if he wants the job. Hoyte of course is watching the front-runners, and maybe he is having some laughs at their expense; Hoyte knows who he has in mind. Vice-Chairman, Vincent Alexander tried to trap Hoyte with a Stabroek letter in which Alexander pointed out to the elevation of Jagdeo from among the elites of the PPP and not the general PPP membership. Alexander said that Hoyte would not go that route. But Alexander should remember Hoyte's sobriquet, `Silver Fox'. And the fox has outsmarted his hunters. Hoyte has named to himself the new leader of the PNC. Raphael Trotman. Hoyte was proteged by Burnham. And Burnham was essentially suspicious of working class leaders assuming control. Burnham felt that such leaders would take their demagoguery in power undermining the capacity to be sophisticated in political planning. And one certainly cannot deny that Burnham was a political planner par excellence. His ability to finesse politics to his advantage as a leader is unquestioned. And Burnham did make the right choice in demoting Green and promoting Hoyte. For all the avuncular love Green has for Burnham, Hamilton Green knew Burnham would never have allowed him to become president. Hoyte is more comfortable with middle class politicians. I believe like Burnham, it has more to do with capacity to manoeuvre rather than middle class snobbery. Forbes Burnham was no elite, no snub, but he was both practical and pragmatic. For him, the perpetuity of PNC rule was better ensured by an educated middle class boy from Queen's College. Hoyte has learned that from his mentor and will go with Trotman. Can Trotman pilot the PNC to electoral victory in 2001? If he loses, is he complex and versatile enough to keep the PNC alive as a national institution? Whether he can do it or not, Hoyte believes he has more class to lead the PNC than the working-class pugilists who once they are in, will be unable to relate to and win the upper strata of Guyanese society. And this is the problem for the PNC at the moment. The PNC has and will maintain for the election, the support of the African working class. The sections that must be reached are the business class, middle class Africans, middle class Indians, disenchanted Indian proletarians, and that sizeable outside force called the Guyanese diaspora. Are Norton, Corbin and Alexander suave, urbane, sophisticated, philosophically complex, Aristotelian in approach, Lockean in tolerance, and nationally likeable to achieve that monumental task more than the Queen's College trained Attorney-at-law, Raphael Trotman? Perhaps that question can best be answered by Hamilton Green.
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