Former PUP Senior Deputies, Mark Espat and Cordel Hyde have officially been kicked off the PUP Executive. The decision was made at a party executive meeting on Friday - but no announcement was made until today.
A release was issued this morning, which says that the Party Leader - on the authority of the National Executive - was authorized to come up with a new composition for that same executive.
Slightly odd - as usually the members of the executive are appointed by a National Convention of National Party council, but no matter, today it was executive by edict or at least press release. An official release says that in deciding who got to stay and who got the boot, Party Leader Francis Fonseca was guided by the following criteria - and we quote:
One: Were existing members of the NE in their current posts functioning and effective?
Two: Had existing members of the executive publicly or privately expressed their willingness... to continue serving?
Seems like a roundabout way to say that Mark Espat and Cordel Hyde had been less than enthusiastic about the ascent of the new leader and seemed disinterested in party events - and so they had to go.
And so, the posts of senior deputies have been abolished, and the men who occupied it have both been removed from the executive.
Notably, two men considered to be their allies Bill Lindo, who was the Research and Development Coordinator and Hugh O Brien, the liaison for Civil Society and Social Partners have also been removed from the executive; they will now have Non-Executive posts.
Another casualty of the executive reduction is Luke Espat, who post of National Strategic Development Manager has also been made non-executive. Corona Villafranco's post of parliamentary Liaison has also been abolished.
But while those three posts have been cut, the top heavy executive still carries 30 persons - and for every loser there was a winner.
And the biggest winner has to be Arthur Saldivar. In what can only be interpreted as a reward for the full frontal assault he put on Mark Espat in his stalking horse candidacy for party leader, Saldivar has been promoted to serve on both the executive and in the senate.
He will co-chair the Policy and Reform Committee along with Narda Garcia.
He will also take up Eamon Courtenay's vacated Senate Seat joining Lisa Shoman and Oscar Requena.
The other big winner is Florencio Marin Junior, who now becomes one of the party's three deputies, joining Carolyn Trench Sandiford and Mike Espat.
And since former central Bank Governor Sydney Campbell turned down the PUP to serve as treasurer, Stann Creek West Standard Bearer Rodwell Ferguson has been activated to serve in that post.
Overall, the executive moves see new Leader Francis Fonseca making bold moves - primarily to purge Espat and Hyde from the executive. Whether those moves are strategically sound with months to go before municipal elections, will be left to be seen. Both Espat and Hyde control what are considered to be sure seats.
