THE definitive work on the five months of conspiracies and stratagems to reshape the legitimate results of the March 2020 elections is the book, “Democracy Prevails: The Chronicle of the Guyana 2020 election.” This is one of the most heavily footnoted books I have ever read and those footnotes are a scholarly phenomenon.

This book is one of the most important texts to be found in the historiography of this country. It will become in decades to come, a guide to the history of Guyana in the 21st century. This is good stuff about the tragedy of Guyana, a tragedy that the young generation of Guyana should never witness again.

One should be incensed at the barefacedness of the Guyana Human Rights Association (GHRA) objecting to a full-page advertisement reminding Guyanese of some of the names that either supported the five-month dramatic conspiracy, or remained silent.

If we are going to record history which is the task of every human on Planet Earth, then there is only one way such documentation can be done if it is to be part of the country’s history – the facts have to be enumerated and be repeated.
We can offer interpretations and analyses of facts, but those facts remain physical constructs that are permanent structures.

The examples run into the billions. We will take just one example. Why did country ‘A’ expel a foreign diplomat? Was he a spy? Did he engage in criminal activities? Was he expelled because he held a dangerous secret for the host government? Maybe we will never get the answer, but the fact that remains permanent was that he was expelled.

Democracy Prevails: The Chronicle of the Guyana 2020 Elections is a documentation of five months of factual occurrences to derail the March 2020 national election. Here are some samples of facts from that book for the month of April in 2020.

1-GECOM orders a recount of all ballots
2-Chief Election Officer proposes a 156-days timeline for recount
3-APNU+AFC hires American firm of JJ&B to lobby the American establishment in support of APNU+AFC victory at the March 2020 election. A dossier was submitted to JJ&B which bore the name of Michael Granger as the author.

This dossier listed the Guyanese President as an American citizen. President Granger issued a statement saying he was not aware that his government had hired JJ&B. Minister of State in the Ministry of the Presidency, Joseph Harmon, issued a statement saying fees for JJ& B came from APNU supporters “around the world” and not from the Guyana Government

4-Prime Minister Moses Nagamootoo issued an edict that the recount could not go beyond 6 PM (18:00hrs) and foreign officials who come to observe the recount will only be allowed to be present at the recount station 14 days after their arrival, because they have to be quarantined for that amount of time because of COVID-19.

These are just four facts for April 2020. One must remember there is an ocean of facts that occurred from March 3, 2020, to July 30, 2020. It is this long period that has permanently damaged the credibility of many personalities and organisations in Guyana. Against this background, one is bewildered at the GHRA’s indignation over the full-page advertisement reminding Guyanese of these people and those organisations.

For five months, people connected to the GECOM Secretariat, the PNC and the AFC were engaged in a dangerous manipulation of the election results and organisations’ civil society activists said absolutely nothing. The GHRA is one of them. I want Dr. Bertrand Ramcharran to note that it is my right to state whom I admire and whom I don’t. It is my right to express my view of who I respect and whom I have no respect for. That is a centuries-old right that should never be curtailed

I do not have any respect for Dr. Ramcharran when in 2023 he asked me not to criticise Mr. Mike McCormack of the GHRA. What took place for five months was one of the most dangerous moments in the life of Guyana, yet the GHRA was unmoved. The very month (August) the president was sworn in, post-election violence reared its bestial head.

Opposition politicians used the suspected drug-related homicides of two Afro-Guyanese youths at Cotton Tree and exclaimed that Indians in that village killed them. Mayhem followed in which Indian people were beaten. And where was the voice of Mr. McCormack then? It was very loud. He became overzealous in his demand that the government bring in forensic experts to determine how the youths were killed. The sub-text of Mr. McCormack’s narrative paralleled that of the PNC.

For five months, the people and groups that were named in that advertisement didn’t find their voices, but now their voices are reverberating about the oil industry. This is evil hypocrisy!

DISCLAIMER: The views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the Guyana National Newspapers Limited.