IF IT is really not the case that the main opposition party, APNU, is deeply engaged in spreading mischievous and slanderous rumours with exactly one week more to go before the November 28 elections, then it should at least reflect on the harm it is doing to itself — and by extension a peaceful electoral process — with the recurring unlawful behaviour and violent incidents at campaign meetings of the incumbent PPP/C.
Last Friday’s PPPC’s meeting at the Stabroek Market Square, where threatening behaviour by supporters of APNU made necessary the dispatching of a contingent of the ‘Riot Squad’ of the Guyana Police Force, had deteriorated to the level that required tremendous restraint by the police against evident provocation.
This ugly incident which makes a  mockery of APNU’s signature to the Code of Conduct, prepared by the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM), was preceded by instigated rowdyism and violence at a public meeting of the PPP/C at Victoria village on the East Coast Demerara. The peaceful residents of the village were themselves aghast at elements who chose to engage in unprovoked physical attacks on members in the crowd, even resorting to dousing one individual with kerosene.
The police have been appealing for all contesting parties and their supporters to keep the campaign free from violence. It is to be hoped that in this crucial final week before voting day,  good sense will prevail to deter threatening behaviour and, worse, violent incidents at public meetings.
The monitoring process of the 2011 elections by local, regional and foreign observers has officially begun. Their respective teams will, therefore, be able to make their own assessments of the atmosphere in which the campaign is taking place, and whether or not the contesting parties are indeed honouring their pledged commitment to GECOM’s Code of Conduct. 
Meanwhile, APNU on Friday finally released its long-promised manifesto. It did so towards the conclusion of a public meeting at New Amsterdam and aware, as it should be, that the lateness of this exercise is hardly the way to encourage confidence among potential voters it is seeking to woo.
Ironically, its strategic, outside, non-APNU ‘partner’, the AFC, is yet to release what could be considered a manifesto, even at this very late stage of campaigning.  
APNU’s approach to the 2011 elections, including the fomenting of race-oriented hysteria at meetings, particularly in certain coastal villages and urban communities, as well as the timing and manner of release of its manifesto, contrasts sharply in some respects to the 2006 campaign of the PNCR (today’s dominant APNU member) under the then presidential leadership of Robert Corbin.
But this would be a political post-mortem issue for the PNCR and its allies in APNU after the verdict of the electorate on Monday, November 28. For now, as desperation deepens among strategists of APNU and its unofficial ally, the AFC, Guyanese across political boundaries should give their full support to the disciplined forces to preserve the rule of law as the campaign enters the final lap.