Longtime member of the Alliance for Change David Patterson has tendered his resignation as the General Secretary of the party, surprising the party’s executive and other members.

In his letter of resignation as General Secretary, Mr. Patterson said he will remain a member of the Alliance for Change and will continue to play a role in the party, just not the role of General Secretary.

He said he will continue to maintain his membership in full and support and participate in party activities.

The letter was addressed to the Leader of the party Khemraj Ramjattan and copied to the party’s Vice-Chair. It carried today’s date.

Members of the party’s management committee were blindsided by the resignation.

AFC Leader Khemraj Ramjattan said he is convinced that Patterson’s resignation as his party’s General Secretary is as a result of the AFC being shut out of the Vice Chairman position on the Region Four Democratic Council.

Mr. Ramjattan explained that there was an agreement between the coalition partners, APNU and AFC that the AFC will be given the Vice Chairman positions in Regions 4 and 7.

He said the APNU Councillors supported the election of an AFC Councillor to the position of Vice-Chair in Region 7 but at the Region Four elections, the coalition partner used its majority to elect one of its members, Samuel Sandy, to the Vice-Chairman position over the AFC’s nominee Neilson McKenzie.

When there was a call for nominees for the position, the AFC nominated Mckenzie while the APNU nominated Samuel Sandy.

At the end of voting, the APNU and the PPP were tied on 14 votes each with the AFC holding onto five votes.

The Chairman was forced to cast a tie-breaking vote and he did so in favour of the APNU candidate.

Mr. Ramjattan said Mr. Patterson was not happy with what took place at the Region Four elections since he was part of the negotiating team that reached the agreement.

He said while Patterson has indeed tendered his resignation from the General Secretary position, he is still talking to him, hoping that he will pull it back and see how the two parties can work out their differences.

Patterson is a frontbencher in Parliament for the APNU+AFC and served as the Minister of Public Works in the APNU+AFC government.

Related posts:

Region 4 Chairman disallows AFC’s No-Confidence motion against Vice Chair Councillors were unaware of APNU+AFC Vice-Chair; Harmon cites breakdown in communication AFC Executive for emergency meeting over Region 4 Vice-Chair fallout Patterson tells AFC he intends to resign from Parliament