I think we need to set the record straight on the callous legacy of the PNC regime.
In 2000, distinguished Professor Clive Thomas described the PNC regime, thus: “The truth however, is that this regime had been installed in power through a colonial manouever with the electoral system before Independence in 1966, and maintained itself in power for nearly three decades through the systematic rigging of national elections and the employment of force and intimidation against all opposition to it. ” The ruling PNC elite wielded enormous coercion, where the Party saw no end to its authority and regulated all social life.
After 28 years of dictatorial rule by the PNC, the PPP won the 1992 election and transformed Guyana’s political system into a democracy. In fact, the international-based Freedom House has deemed Guyana ‘free’ with regard to political rights and civil liberties since 1993; and the Democracy Index of the Economist documented Guyana as a democracy, and not as an authoritarian or hybrid regime. Guyana is free.

During the PNC’s ruling years, the National Security Act suspended the right to Habeas Corpus; and enabled the PNC regime to restrict and detain Guyanese without trial for an indefinite period. Part II of the National Security Act was reenacted in 1977 to indefinitely detain Guyanese without bail and trial.

Today, there is freedom of the press, which enables the new opposition to detail its political thinking. Nonetheless, with no broadcasting law and little self-monitoring, media distortions abound. The paradox of freedom here in Guyana is that grand media distortions are the norm amid the presence of fundamental human rights. In my judgment, there is an abuse of press freedom.

The PPP/C Government reinstated human rights in this country; and it carries an historic track record since 1953 of advancing equality before the law for all persons; and making discrimination against all people unlawful through the Prevention of Discrimination Act 1997 and the institution of the Ethnic Relations Commission. It was this Administration that endorsed the Optional Protocol on the UN Covenant on Civil and Political Rights; the previous PNC regime was not a signatory.