–ignored consultation meeting on electoral laws
–continues to peddle misinformation on election procedure

VICE-President, Dr. Bharrat Jagdeo, has weighed in on the participation of opposition political parties in the 2023 local government elections.
In an exclusive interview published on social media on Wednesday evening, the VP said there is an “industry” growing in the opposition camps which is built on misleading the public on issues of national importance including local government elections.

He said there are many persons who present themselves as specialists but do a lot of damage through misinformation, which requires a lot of effort to get to the truth of the matter.
As an example, Dr. Jagdeo noted that while there were some persons making statements that the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) government was delaying the holding of local government elections, that position misrepresented the reality that it is the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) must have first indicated its readiness to facilitation the elections.

The Vice-President said after GECOM completed that process, the body’s Chairman, Justice (Ret’d) Claudette Singh wrote to government indicating March 13, 2023 as the earliest possible date for local government elections.

He noted that at first opportunity, government, through the Minister of Local Government and Regional Development, Nigel Dharamlall, set the earliest possible date for the local government polls.

AFC DECIMATED
Earlier Friday, during a press conference of the Alliance For Change (AFC), that party’s leader Khemraj Ramjattan addressed a position made by one of the party’s leaders, Cathy Hughes in a media report which suggested that the AFC would not contest the upcoming LGE.

Ramjattan countered Hughes’ statements to the media saying that his party’s national executive body has the final decision on whether the party will contest the local government polls.
“I rather suspect that Cathy was speaking personally. Cathy feels strongly that we must not go into the elections,” Ramjattan said in response to questions posed by a journalist on the flip-flopping of the AFC on its involvement in local government elections.

Questioned on whether it has the finances and the voter support to contest the election, Ramjattan said that determination is still to be made. Questioned again about what are some of the factors that would influence his party’s contesting of local government polls, Ramjattan dodged the question, noting his party would “keep that confidential”.

Commenting on that situation, VP Jagdeo recounted on Friday that the AFC had contested local government elections alone while in office and did not win any councils, which showed that their support was low.
“I would not put it past them not to contest the elections not because of any fear that the [Official] List [of Electors] is bloated but to save face because they know they will practically be further wiped out if there is anything like that that you could be practically limited from having any say at the national level,” VP Jagdeo said, underscoring that the AFC support base has been wiped out.

The VP criticised the A Partnership for National Unity (APNU) for shirking its responsibility of sanitation and street maintenance in the city, which central government has had to take up to ensure the city remains clean.

VOTERS’ LIST
Turning his attention to the Official List of Electors (OLE), VP Jagdeo said the PPP/C government accepts there is a method for cleaning dead people from the list.
He said the new Representation of the People Act would require the names of deceased persons to be drawn from the General Register Office (GRO) by GECOM, and those names would have to be published by the elections body.

Once that is done, all the names would be sent to the political parties and once there is no objections, the names would be removed from the voters’ list.
As it relates to the removal of non-resident Guyanese, Dr Jagdeo relied on a previous court ruling that Guyanese cannot be removed from the voters’ list because they are not resident in Guyana, a measure which was agreed to by all parties involved in the reform of the Constitution of Guyana in the early 2000s.

“You cannot vote from abroad, but you can come back and vote because no longer is ‘residency’ a requirement to be on the list,” the VP clarified, noting that the position of the APNU+AFC would go against the Constitution, which is Guyana’s supreme law. “Any constitutional change has to be to enfranchise, not disenfranchise,” Dr Jagdeo maintained.

GECOM Commissioner, Clement Rohee, through his social media, also questioned the motives of the APNU+AFC since it has shirked the opportunity to attend an upcoming forum at the Arthur Chung Conference Centre (ACCC) which would discuss the draft amendments to Guyana’s electoral laws.

“The APNU+AFC is either living in a bubble of their own making or in a surreal world. In both, they prance around in an effort to wipe away the shame and disgrace they brought upon themselves and the nation when they attempted to perpetrate one of the most despicable and dastardly acts in modern electoral history and thwart the Guyanese people’s march towards democratic governance, economic and social progress and all-round human development,” Commissioner Rohee wrote.