Dear Editor
JULIANNE Gaul on November 21, 2022, challenged few of my ideas on the voters’ list, but failed to produce any evidence to show how voting at home by registered overseas-based Guyanese would be detrimental to the country and the integrity of the electoral process.

Instead of evidence, Gaul revelled in rhetorical flourishes, implying that House-to-House (H-to-H) registration is the panacea for credible elections. This is a myth.
It is also noted that the legality (and constitutionality) of the presence of overseas-based Guyanese on the voters’ list has been competently addressed. There is no need to revisit this issue.

I was asked whether I agreed that the 1992 elections were free and fair and whether I supported the preceding House-to-House registration. A claim was also made that thousands of Guyanese living and working abroad were removed from the Register of Registrants then. But where is the evidence for this claim?

Interesting to this discussion is that the voters’ list compiled from the 1991 H-to-H registration followed widespread electoral fraud by the PNC in national elections from 1968 to 1985.

Here are some startling data on the scope of electoral fraud. In 1980, the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) was allocated 14 parliamentary seats compared to 37 seats for the PNC. In 1980, 10 seats went to the PPP while 41 went to the PNC.

In 1985, the parliamentary seats allocation following the election was eight for the PPP while the PNC grabbed 42.

This pattern of electoral abuse led to widespread political agitation and persistent calls for reform of the electoral process by opposition forces, including the PPP which, along with other political forces and civil society, formed the Patriotic Coalition for Democracy.

The rapid downturn of the economy in the 1980s saw the international community supporting Guyana by bringing the political parties to the negotiating table.

The PNC agreed, among other things, to count votes at polling stations and not at army headquarters or other locations; to facilitate H-to-H registration because the entire electoral system was compromised; and to expand the Elections Commission for better representation of the political parties.

Despite these and other measures at electoral reform, the International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES) observed in 1995 that the “the Guyana electoral system requires extensive rehabilitation to achieve adequate standards of fairness, efficiency and sustainability.”

This statement aligns to my position that the voters’ list is just one aspect of the electoral system, and that other components such as professionalization of GECOM staff, are equally important.

Notwithstanding the struggle to make changes and correct errors in the electoral system which had been skewed in favour of the PNC, it was evident that a voters’ list compiled from H-to-H registration is not without serious flaws.

To suggest that H-to-H registration is a better method than “continuous cycles of registration” to achieve clean and credible elections is not borne out by historical or empirical evidence.

While a clean voters’ list is a vital component of a credible election process, the lessons from the fraudulent elections of the PNC’s reign, and the events of the 2020 general elections demonstrate that a GECOM staff member following political operatives poses a graver threat to democracy and electoral integrity than taking away the right of registered overseas-based Guyanese to exercise their franchise.

Yours sincerely,
Dr Tara Singh