Quote: ‘…it is morally reprehensible for the AFC’s presidential candidate to remark and to impute motives in the absence of evidence, that some people may not have an interest in registering to vote; even if that were the case, there is a moral and social responsibility for political parties to deepen enfranchisement’ I INDIFFERENTLY and invariably see the People’s National Congress Reform (PNCR) as anything but the PNCR; I do not see it as this thing known as APNU, or even as PNCR coalition. But whatever the PNCR is, it won the first electoral round against the Alliance for Change (AFC) in the National Assembly a few days ago. The PNCR voted with the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) on a registration amendment. The AFC did not.
After the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) announced the reopening of the Claims & Objections (C & O) period last Monday for 13 days, commencing on July 25, 2011, the National Assembly subsequently amended the National Registration Act 44. Members of Parliament in favour and five opposed. This amendment now provides the opportunity for unregistered voters to become registered voters; many were unable to previously register because they did not possess the birth certificate source document, a situation not totally within their control.
In the parliamentary sitting on the amendment measure, the AFC’s presidential candidate Khemraj Ramjattan — as the media reported, and I hope it is accurate, pointed to the People’s Progressive Party/Civic’s (PPP/C) “new-found love for enfranchising those who absolutely did not either take care after a three-year period of getting registered or probably for some other reason or consideration simply did not want to get registered.”
In a democratic context, all political parties carry the burden of social responsibility to ensure that no person experiences disenfranchisement, especially if that disenfranchisement is reversible in the near term without creating any institutional disquiet.
Furthermore, it is morally reprehensible for the AFC’s presidential candidate to remark and to impute motives in the absence of evidence, that some people may not have an interest in registering to vote; even if that were the case, there is a moral and social responsibility for political parties to deepen enfranchisement. In addition, what does it matter if broadening the enfranchisement base violates the constitutional deadline of December 28 for the scheduling of elections by one week or one month? Which is more important, widening enfranchisement at the cost of some election scheduling delay, or limiting enfranchisement at the cost of meeting the constitutional deadline of December 28?
Nonetheless, in whatever which way a person reviews the reopening of C & O, the matter is critically related to the principles and best practices of universal adult suffrage. For this reason, the AFC fails to grasp the sacrosanct nature of universal adult suffrage, especially in post-colonial societies, where the struggle for universal adult suffrage did not come easy.
It was the trade union movement cum political parties in the Caribbean that first came to anything close to a confrontation with colonial hegemony, including the struggle for the right to vote without distinction.
At that time, Guyana led the way in trade union fervor that swept the Caribbean; a United Nations Special Study in 1956 reported that British Guiana (now Guyana) had 34 and 38 trade unions in 1946 and 1950, respectively, and for those same years trade unions in Barbados numbered 4 and 3, Jamaica 24 and 12, Trinidad & Tobago with 16 and 32,The Leeward Islands 3 and 4, and The Windward Islands 0 and 10, respectively. Daniel (1957) noted that people then expressed terms of endearment to trade unions, as they saw trade unions as their protector for everything including the right to vote. Thus, Guyanese voters and politicians must acknowledge their own local trade unions and other entities role in the bitter struggle to achieve the right to vote without distinction.
And last week I said: “In 1945, Jagan spoke about the ballot box and the growth of democracy. To continue this story of democracy, the birth of the PPP in 1950 engaged in unrelenting agitation for Independence, where its primary demands included universal adult suffrage and a fully elected legislature. This vehement campaign for which the PPP is well known, drew the ire of British planters, thereby quickening the creation of the Waddington Commission which conceded to the PPP’s significant demands.”
The point of this little history is that no eligible voter must be denied the right to vote; the history was too turbulent in gaining this right. And for the AFC to oppose the parliamentary amendment to re-open the C & O period is equivalent to denying Guyanese voters the right to vote; by this action, the AFC committed the ultimate sin against people of this beloved country. And the PNCR with some amount of political experience played the right card, leaving the politically-inexperienced and perhaps, the political rookie in the cold. As I previously noted on May 22, 2011, the AFC may have also ran in the imminent 2011 national election. The AFC’s opposition to this amendment pretty much confirms its concession to electoral defeat in 2011.