The Alliance For Change (AFC) yesterday hosted its 8th National Conference concluding a campaign to elect the team of new leaders who will take the party into the 2025 General and Regional Elections.
After a fiercely contested slate of candidates that saw an exciting mix of youth and experienced long standing members vying for the key positions on the executive, attorney-at-law Nigel Hughes was declared winner and the new Leader with 149 votes to his main rival and former General Secretary Sherod Duncan’s 62.
The new leader has called on President Irfaan Ali to immediately convene a meeting of all the parliamentary political parties, major civil society stakeholder, economists both local and international to establish a commitment to a consensus based ten-to-fifteen-year national development plan in five key areas – Economy, Education, Foreign Relations, Health and Poverty. This plan should become enshrined in law.
Delivering the charge to the delegates and observers Leader Nigel Hughes immediately co-opted leading members of the opposing slate to be part of the Executive and they graciously accepted. He then went on to deliver an inspiring vision positioning the AFC as “the force” in the upcoming 2025 election.
The Leader urged the Party to undertake a comprehensive review of its performance in office to examine the missteps which lead to its loss of office in 2020 so that it can take the lessons from the past in crafting a pathway to the future.
In great detail he outlined the future thrust of the Party and its commitment to reach out to all Guyanese irrespective of political persuasion, all key stakeholders and civic organisations including the private sector, trade unions, women’s and youth movements.
Hughes charged the conference delegates to be prepared for national elections and the agenda for change is Guyana, “Better must Come.”
The new Chairman of the Party is David Patterson whose 150 votes exceeded Juretha Fernandes’ 69.
Michael Carrington is the new Vice Chair and co-founder of the AFC Raphael Trotman now holds the position of General Secretary. The conference also elected the twelve members of the National Executive Committee NEC which will manage the Party.
The party delegates numbering over two hundred represented the deri regions of Guyana, the Youth For Change and Women For Change groups with most attending in person at the Revealed Word Christian Centre in William Street, Kitty.
The election process was expertly managed by returning officers Christopher Ram and Trevor Benn and team. The contingent of delegates voting online were from region 9 who could not attend given the recent inclement weather conditions which made travel to Georgetown difficult, and members of the AFC diaspora chapters in the USA and the Caribbean.
The Conference was historic as this was the first time that none of the surviving founding members of the Party were vying for the position of leader.