Georgetown: The People’s Progressive Party (PPP) will be selecting its Presidential Candidate over the weekend as the Executive Committee is expecting to cast their votes in favour of the five hopefuls.
The five candidates contesting for the position, namely: Opposition Chief Whip Gail Teixeira; former Attorney General Anil Nandlall; former Housing Minister Irfaan Ali; former Culture, Youth and Sport Minister Dr Frank Anthony; and Member of Parliament Dr Vindhya Persaud.
Last week, these candidates made their case in presentations before the Party’s Executive, and their submissions were discussed ahead of this weekend’s voting via secret ballot.
Previously, in the PPP, the presidential candidate was consensually nominated, but this time around there are more than one candidate; as such, the party resorted to using the secret ballot.
However, PPP General Secretary Bharrat Jadgeo believes that a consensus candidate would have been the more desired way forward.
Jagdeo, who is also the Opposition Leader, said, “It’s always better to have a consensus candidate, in any organisation that’s the idea thing… [So] which party doesn’t want to have a consensus? Shouldn’t that be what you want to work towards? Is that not the best thing to do?”
Moreover, Jagdeo said the PPP is also looking to create a “big tent” when in office, to include civil society and other stakeholders who have been approaching the party, expressing desires to work with the party.
“We are a party that give young people opportunities. I was in my 20s when I became a minister, I was 35 when my party selected me to take the office of the president,” he said.
Now, he added, this trend continues with one of the presidential candidates being in his 30s, two in their 40s, another in his 50s and one in her 60s.
“So we have a range of people with years of experience as well. They had worked themselves up to the leadership of the party and they had not just the government experience, but went to the congress; they got elected; they went to the [Central Committee], and then they got to the Executive… So we have a proven track record with young people,” Jagdeo reaffirmed.
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