Former Guyanese President and People’s National Congress (PNC) Leader, David Granger today reaffirmed the party’s founder, Linden Forbes Sampson Burnham’s stance against factionalism, as the PNC celebrates its 64th Anniversary.
See full statement below:
The People’s National Congress celebrates the 64th anniversary of its establishment on 5th October 1957. Our Founder-Leader Forbes Burnham, at the Party’s First Biennial Delegates Congress in 1975, warned of the menace of factionalism:
To be sponsoring and joining factions in the Party is to indulge in anti-Party activity calculated to weaken…the Party. There may be different motivations, some springing from personal ambition, others from a minority position firmly held. Whichever it may be, the objective result is undesirable and deleterious. Factions and factionalists are wittingly, or unwittingly, instruments of our enemies…”
Our Founder-Leader was committed to “…reinforcing the solidarity of our Party by knitting groups together, not splitting them apart; by building up, not breaking down; by multiplying – not dividing and subtracting – membership and to suppressing schisms, factionalism and opportunism.”
Our Founder-Leader, equally, was always conscious of the changing conditions in the country and the Party’s response to contemporary challenges. The PNC’s transition from a party in opposition to one in government necessitated changes.
Guyana prepared to embark on a path to become a republic and the majority of ministers from the original cohort changed after the first term in office ended with the 1968 General Elections.
The PNC again entered government as part of a multi-ethnic coalition in 2015 and is now in opposition. The Party is still pursuing the true path charted by our Founder-Leader. The new cohort of Parliamentarians has been elected to consolidate the Party’s massive popular support by intensifying the effort to realise the objective of providing a good life for everyone during the coming Decade of Development.
