Political combinations, mergers and coalitions have littered the modern political process in Guyana: the People’s National Congress (PNC) largely resulted from the PPP (Burnhamite) merger with a couple of smaller political parties in the late 1950s. However, of the early coalitions, it is the post-election coalition between the PNC and the United Force (UF), which removed the PPP from government in 1964, that still somewhat resonates in the public’s mind.
The recent PNCR+AFC pre-election coalition that won government from the PPP/C in 2015 was largely a constitutionally determined political arrangement: a constitutional dictate that is still mainly responsible for the present dilemma those parties must now overcome if there is to be a good chance of their again electorally removing the PPP from government. Note too that all of Guyana’s modern coalitions have been rooted in a particular politically virulent expression of race/ethnicity that is as alive today as it ever was and will not be quelled by a resort to wilful ignorance.
Coalitions are sometimes formed to deal with existential national difficulties, but the usual reason parties form elections coalition is because they wish to win government. Parties may also collate to broaden their geographical, class or ethnic appeal. Both Forbes Burnham’s membership in the PPP in the 1950s and the PPP’s 1992 formation of the Civic can be located in concerns about race and class.
Coalitions are rarely found in countries with majoritarian – particularly presidential – electoral systems under which a candidate must receive an absolute majority of the votes to be elected. They are more present in proportional representation systems that normally make it relatively easy for small parties to participate and succeed and where, for one reason or another, the population votes for political parties instead of individual candidates.
Generally, to function efficiently, coalition governments should be made up of no more than the minimum number of parties needed to secure the majority vote in the legislature, but this depends on the specific demographic context. The literature suggests that coalitions can result in more consensual, fair and democratic politics, as a government comprising differing parties with different ideologies will need to compromise.
That said, to be successful, coalition governments must be beneficial to all parties. There must be a sense of partnership, and even if member parties are different in size, all parties must be open to compromise. Importantly, ‘a partnership does not mean that all responsibilities and positions are divided evenly within the coalition, but that each party is respected for the unique attributes it brings to the coalition and is given a fair and equitable say in how decisions are made and benefits and resources are shared’ (https://www.thoughtco.com/what-is-a-coalition-government).
On the negative side, minority parties may try to play ‘kingmaker’ and, particularly in close elections, gain far more power in exchange for their support than the size of their vote would otherwise justify. When a party with little popular support is offered positions of power they have not achieved through the electoral process, it could impose its views and policies on the majority and thus coalition governments can occasionally function less democratically.
Most important for this discourse is that Guyana has a plurality, semi-presidential, i.e. mixed presidential/parliamentary system, which, as occurred in 2011, dictates that the president and the government, should be chosen by the party that gains largest number of votes at an election even if it is a minority in the legislature, and a post-election coalition to form the presidency and government is not allowed.
On my reading, this is the major reason the APNU+AFC coalition came into being. When this restriction is coupled to the largely bicommunal political nature of Guyana’s ethnic voting pattern, the political context becomes complicated in important ways. For example, if a party wins the government and legislature, given the democratic universalist manner – i.e., without taking into consideration the ethnic context – in which all other government bodies are appointed, that party will have almost unlimited control of the political process and thus tremendous influence over the judiciary. And there goes the separation of powers that is a central pillar of democratic politics!
It gets worse: today Guyana is ruled by an elected ethnic autocracy that by way of the above mechanisms has ‘captured the state’ and is using it to deliberately manipulate and suppress the other ethnicities to win their electoral support and/or keep them in check. As I observed last week, the fact that the PPP needs to hand pick those of other ethnicities to represent Guyana’s African citizens at conferences such as those held by the International Decade for People of African Descent, gives the lie to its One Guyana ethnic vision!
The PNC/AFC coalition discourse broke down over the choice of the presidential candidate and the allocations of parliamentary seats. The AFC wants 40% of the parliamentary seats and to determine who should be the coalition presidential candidate. When the PNC had its worst electoral showing in 2006, the AFC could only muster about 23% of the seats the PNC received: 5 to 22. In 2011, when there was the hung parliament, the AFC gained 27% of the seats the PNC received: 7 to 26. Indeed, added together, the coalition votes fell and there was a resurgence of PPP support in 2020, mainly in areas in which the AFC had done well in 2015. Add to this the question of how one should deal with the other parties in the coalition if the AFC is given 40% of the parliamentary seats.
As for talk about the presidential candidate, in trying to be ‘kingmaker’, the AFC has joined the undemocratic bandwagon, seeming to want democracy only when it favours them. After all, Aubrey Norton was democratically chosen by the proposed coalition party with the overwhelming number of ‘proven’ votes to be its presidential candidate. Furthermore, there is absolutely nothing in its record during the coalition government or after to indicate that the AFC should be considered proportionately more worthy than the PNC or any of the other coalition members. As a matter of fact, the opposite is probably true.
The nature of the political system does not allow the AFC to prove its worth and then come to the table, and astroturfing is the order of the day. But I also find it difficult to believe that the AFC would relinquish the chance given to it by the recent behaviour of the PPP in sending out its trolls to ask what the PNC or the APNU+AFC coalition have done for Africans. Of course, it is not what they have done for Africans: it is what they would never have done to Africans or any other ethnic group in Guyana., namely use the state to suppress them to a point where they must join the PPP or suffer.
From its modus operandi, is a clear that the PPP does not understand that democratic governments are not elected to do more for one group than the other. By now, capitalism would have disappeared in revolutions if it had not adopted aspects of socialism, and liberal democracy must perennially seek to deal with historic wrongs and inequalities if it is to survive.
