Mr Khemraj Ramjattan, one of the bright young minds of the People's Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) has been expelled. It happened shortly after he embarrassed President Bharrat Jagdeo by insisting that the President did accuse him of leaking information to the US embassy and the media.

But what was the real reason for Mr Ramjattan's expulsion? Why did the party's leaders determine that it would be too costly to keep Mr Ramjattan and that he should be banished into silence, and discredited him in the eyes of party loyalists? Party group meetings have already started to explain the Mr Ramjattan affair and to solidify support behind the party.

The big question is why was Mr Ramjattan seen as such a damaging influence on the party leadership at this time and why would 29 members of its central executive ostracise a bright and outspoken mind championing the cause of good governance? Could there be an element of political pantomime, as has been suggested, or does it go deeper than that?

Is the real reason the disputed remarks at the January 31st Central Committee meeting or is it something else? Mr Ramjattan was sitting behind Mr Jagdeo and Mr Moses Nagamootoo was opposite the President. Mrs Janet Jagan was on Mr Jagdeo's left and Mr Komal Chand on his right. Yet only Mr Ramjattan and Mr Nagamootoo heard the remarks.

The President has been known on occasion, both as finance minister and as president, to speak out of turn. But while Mr Ramjattan's public challenging of the President's denial and the entire episode in the media were provocative, it does not explain why 29 members would gang up together.

This especially does not make sense when one looks at Mr Ramjattan's January 2003 column in this newspaper in which he committed the gravest of sins by accusing the matriarch of the party, Mrs Janet Jagan, of "tasteless and indiscreet" language. This was in response to a letter she had written commenting on a Stabroek News editorial on the political life of Mr Desmond Hoyte who had passed away the month before and bringing into focus Mr Hoyte's blind-eye treatment of electoral malpractices when he was a member of the Elections Commission. Mr Ramjattan said at the time that her remarks could be more damaging to national consensus "more pregnant with rancorous possibilities than the maddening masses in front of the National Assembly" - a reference to the disrespect meted out to Mr Jagdeo at the ceremony at the Parliament buildings for Mr Desmond Hoyte's funeral. However, he was not called before an Executive Council meeting for this but had offered an apology to Mrs Jagan through Mr Nagamootoo, which was never accepted. This accusation that Mrs Jagan's behaviour was worse than that of the noisy throng might have invited expulsion.

He was not expelled when he crossed swords with President Jagdeo last August over the Helsinki conference when he accused the President of writing the World Bank to attempt to block him, Ramjattan, a party member from attending that conference in July 2003. He was called before the Executive Committee for this but was not sanctioned.

Nor again did he get into trouble after his November 15th 2003 column appeared in which he accused the party of being autocratic rather than democratic on the issue of succession.

The ball to get rid of Mr Ramjattan was set in motion on January 29th, 2004, the day when as President of the Guyana Bar Association, he called for a full enquiry into the accusations by George Bacchus, a former death squad informant, linking Home Affairs Minister, Ronald Gajraj to the gang's operation. The nail in his coffin was his column in the Stabroek News the next day when he called for investigations into Mr Gajraj as well as into the non-issue of a US visa to Foreign Trade Minister Clement Rohee and criticised the President, without naming him, for his outburst against the media at Annandale.

Why would the call for these two investigations be the straw to break the camel's back?

What could come out from such an investigation that led the hackles of party leaders to rise and to decide that the in-house critic had to be silenced?

Why was Mr Rohee the first on the floor to demand at the January 31st meeting that Mr Ramjattan should not be a part of those proceedings? What does he have against an investigation into why he was not yet been issued a US visa and his file is in Washington? And why did the President have to use intemperate language to set the tone of the meeting against Mr Ramjattan (Mr Gajraj is not a member of the central committee)?

But more interestingly, why did Mr Ramjattan's comrades turn their backs on him and solidify support for the President? How much did this have to do with party loyalty as opposed to self-interest? How much of it had to do with the fact that a certain member wants to ascend to a higher office politically or diplomatically or wants the path cleared for an international job in the future and could only do so by towing the line? How much of it had to do with the fact that a brother or daughter of a comrade was given a break by the man behind the throne? How much of it had to do with a comrade wanting to get back into the loop of the government? And how much of it had to do with comrades being yes men and women who have no understanding of the word integrity?

What is the harm in investigating these incidents? As a letter writer pointed out, the presumption of innocence does not nullify the need for an investigation.

The government has more to gain by investigating and making public the results than by trying to whitewash the substantive issues, unless, of course, it does not feel that its ministers are above board in their dealings and has to do a whitewash to protect them. In such a scenario, Mr Ramjattan would be no more than the scapegoat.

There is a political and economic cost of each decision the ruling PPP/C takes and acts intended to realise short term gains may very well turn out to be detrimental in the long haul.