Conversation Tree

FREE, FAIR AND PEACEFUL ELECTIONS

Some foreign observers are unaware of Guyana’s electoral history. One wonders whether such observers are qualified to observe Guyana’s elections. They would not know, for example, that by itself, this history creates a perpetual tension at election time because of general fears of a repeat of election rigging. They would not know also that this is why after twenty-eight years since 1992, Guyana’s first free and fair elections after a generation, Guyana still requires election observers. The suspicion created by this history has resulted in allegations by the PNC and PNCR that the elections of 1992, 1997, 2001 and 2006, which they lost, were rigged against them. And not to be outdone, the PPP claimed that the elections of 2015, which it lost to APNU+AFC by some 5,000 votes, were rigged against it. These elections were all found to be free and fair by foreign observers.

IS A NEW GUYANA IN THE MAKING?

During the 2011 election campaign, the PPP/C held the view that it would obtain the support of up to 60 percent of the electorate. The PPP/C was indoctrinated into false expectations by what appeared to be the adoring crowds that attended events of then President Jagdeo since 1999, even in APNU/PNCR areas of support, inspired at times by President Jagdeo delivering goodies extracted from his back pocket, which he released to the residents with political flourish.

ONE SMALL STEP IN GUYANA’S POLITICS CAN LEAD TO A GIANT LEAP FOR ITS FUTURE

The three political parties that invoked section 22 of the Representation of the People Act (the Act) signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) on Friday setting out the principles on which both their pre- and post-election cooperation will be based. The invocation of section 22, for the first time in Guyana’s electoral history, is one small step which can lead to a giant leap for Guyana’s future. The joinder of lists by the three political parties, A New and United Guyana (ANUG), the Liberty and Justice Party (LJP) and The New Movement (TNM), under section 22 has now led to the unprecedented step of the signing of an MOU for political cooperation among the political parties which have joined together to form the combination of lists, an event among competing political parties that has never hitherto occurred in Guyana.

SAD TO SAY

It is sad to say that the Global Witness report, “Signed Away,” analyzing EEPGL’s (the ExxonMobil controlled Esso Exploration and Production Guyana Limited) agreement with Guyana and the damning circumstances leading up to its signing, will not influence the vote of more than a handful of people, if so many, at the elections on March 2. The report’s main conclusion is that: “Evidence….suggests that Guyana got a bad deal because it may not have been well represented in subsequent negotiations by Minister Raphael Trotman and his team.” The report suggests that “Trotman presented Exxon with feeble negotiation terms and ignored expert advice that more financial information was needed before he signed the licence.”

SHOULD GUYANA TAKE NOTE OF ISABEL DOS SANTOS?

By 2012 African journalists were questioning the origins of Isabel dos Santos’s wealth. But as one commented: “Who’s going to listen to an African journalist?” By 2018, no one bothered asking anymore. (Guardian 24/1/20). Rui Pinto, a Portuguese hacker, facing imprisonment for hacking into football and publishing and exposing questionable practices, also did the same in relation to Isabel dos Santos, the daughter of former President of Angola for 38 years, Jose Edwardo dos Santos. He hacked and released, in what has become known as the ‘Luanda Leaks,’ a mountain of information, over 700,000 documents, exposing the origin, sources and amassing of the over US$2 billion fortune of Isabel dos Santos. The documents were obtained by the Platform to Protect Whistleblowers in Africa and shared with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ). They have been investigated by 37 media organisations.