By Adam Harris
FINANCE MINISTER, Winston Jordan, at a press conference, described the March 2, 2020 elections as the Mother of all Elections. He was not wrong. In fact, his comments were echoed many times after.
The elections were predicted to be the Mother of all Elections because Guyana was developing an oil economy. Money was expected to be flowing and many in the political arena wanted to put their hands on that money.
I remember the disappointment in the wake of the 2015 elections. I remember the People’s Progressive Party crying foul and blaming the Americans for rigging the elections in favour of the coalition. I also remember people from that party saying that the results were skewed because Guyana now had oil.
I watched some people in the previous administration wilt, because, in their eyes they could not bear being out of political office for five years.
Things started to change when Anil Nandlall began representing farmers who were challenging some Government agencies, including the Mahaica-Mahaicony-Abary Agricultural Development Authority. The high profile given to Nandlall and his association suddenly began to bring people out of the woodwork.
Bharrat Jagdeo began to hold regular press conferences, thus getting himself into the limelight. However, he insisted on holding press conferences as Opposition Leader, almost never as General Secretary of the People’s Progressive Party.
I am going to ignore the No Confidence Motion passed on December 18, 2018 except to say that a string of legal challenges delayed the elections. The Guyana Elections Commission which had the power to dictate when elections could be held was suddenly pressured.
House-to-house registration to sanitise the voters’ list was challenged and eventually halted. It mattered not that the validity of the elections rested on a clean list. Political parties were prepared to forego any list just to get to the polls. The spoils were too tempting.
Ever since the elections there have been court challenges. When they went against the government there were legal appeals; when they went against the main opposition party there were not only attacks against the court but also against anyone who supported the decision.
There were severe attacks against the Chairman of the Guyana Elections Commission, against Returning officers and other members of the elections commission.
These attacks also came from people who professed to be non-partisan—people like the Private Sector Commission whose secretary became a candidate for the People’s Progressive Party, the Chairman who was a major beneficiary of the PPP largesse, and Kit Nascimento, the consummate representative of anybody against the Granger administration.
Some of the attacks were so irrational that even when GECOM took decisions there were attempts to reverse those decisions by some of the parties who have a vested interest.
For example, GECOM decided that there would be a total recount of the March 2 ballots from Region One to Region Ten in chronological order. Yet there were moves to have this decision cancelled. All manner of excuses were proffered.
The decision for the total recount was agreed to by both President David Granger and Bharrat Jagdeo as leader of the PPP list of candidates. That is why the party cannot come out and challenge the decision. So it found surrogates.
The recent run-up to the recount has also had its fair share of controversy. When the Caricom team came the first time they had agreed to working with four work stations. This time around there was the PPP proposal that there be 20 work stations.
Counter arguments were that at this time of COVID-19 too many people would be in the venue rendering it unsafe. At the same time, the commission wanted to prevent the happenings at the Ashmin’s building where there were invasions.
The GECOM Chairperson, Justice Claudette Singh, was forced to mediate. She ruled that there should be no more than 10 counting stations. That should have been the end of the matter except elements wanted her to set a timeline for the count.
The woman must await the arrival of the Caricom team, make arrangements for the COVID-19 Taskforce to waive the mandatory 14-day quarantine, waive the curfew for the recount and decide on the maximum number of people who could safely be in the Arthur Chung Conference Centre.
And one should not forget that the members of the Caricom team have not been sitting at home waiting on the call from Guyana. They would require releases from their usual jobs. Justice Singh has no control over those things.
But people without one iota of understanding the reality are accusing the woman of not doing enough. Not one person has attempted to call Prime Minister Moses Nagamootoo who heads the COVID-19 Taskforce. In pursuit of knowledge they could have asked Nagamootoo to share the letter he received from the GECOM Chairperson. At this time the results of the recount will be accepted as the results of the March 2, 2020 elections. Early in the count when discrepancies surface I am going to hear the surrogates making noise but it would not be the noise of protest.
It will be the noise of a group burrowing to get out of sight. Later, these will be the people who would want the support of the general public. Something else must be said for GECOM. In the past protests and objections were not tolerated. The people making the objections were ordered to seek redress by way of an elections petition. This time protests and objections have been heeded and action taken. The desire to please everyone has been overwhelming. I now await the recount.
Source: https://issuu.com/guyanachroniclee-paper/docs/guyana_chronicle_e-paper_4-19-2020