Today is Nomination Day which, in essence, officially kick-starts  the ‘big race’ among the various political parties jostling for power in Guyana. Chairman of the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM), Dr. Steve Surujbally, last week, revealed that some 32 political parties have expressed an interest in contesting the November 28 General and Regional Elections, but observed that this number is expected to reduce to either 10 or 11 parties.
Speaking at a news conference at Cara Lodge, the GECOM Chairman explained that, on Nomination Day, all of the political parties with the intent of contesting the upcoming elections, will submit their respective ‘Lists of Candidates’ to the Chief Elections Officer, Mr. Gocool Boodoo.
The venue and time for submission of the Lists of Candidates is City Hall between 14:00 hrs and 18:00 hrs today.
GECOM has posted on its website all of the forms associated with submission of the Lists of Candidates by political parties for contesting the upcoming elections, as well as an advisory to guide the political parties.
Dr. Surujbally also alluded to the fact that the Official List of Electors (OLE) has been certified and was circulated to all the political parties represented in the recently dissolved National Assembly, as well as other political parties that have requested copies.
On several occasions in the recent past, Dr. Surujbally had given GECOM’s full assurance that the Elections Commission is “very much ready” to hold the upcoming elections. Surujbally also expressed optimism that “good sense will prevail and that we will have a violence-free, fair, and transparent election.”
Elections season in this country has, in the past, been more characterised  by campaigns built on  the politics of mudslinging than the politics of progress.
As much as politics is made out to be a popularity contest, it is anything but that. The whole premise of a democratic political system may be summed up thusly: it is a system which credits the majority of people within a particular society with the collective opinion, information and intuition to decide on who among them they want to govern the social environment in which they exist, giving them the right to either reaffirm their decision or change their minds periodically.
This key democratic element of socio-political flux means that those who are contesting the political leadership of a country must actually work hard to either retain or gain the leadership – there is no perpetually upheld status quo in which the will and concerns of the people become insubstantial in contrast to the whims and luxuries of an entrenched ruling class.
While anyone would agree that you can’t  separate politics from the people practising it, what the people in politics are supposed to be representative of are the issues facing the constituencies.
However, it is pertinent to note that, with every successive presidential and general elections since October 1992, Guyana continues to benefit from constantly improved arrangements to ensure free and fair elections. In addition to the heavy expenditure made to enable GECOM to function as efficiently and as fairly as possible, having various observer missions and a media monitoring mechanism in place are now regular features of presidential and parliamentary elections in Guyana.
All who have valiantly joined in the battle for the restoration of electoral democracy should be very proud of the continuing efforts to make multi-party democracy and good governance a lived experience for this and future generations.