Latest update September 20th, 2026 10:40 AM
Govt., ruling party questions GECOM’s preparedness to hold any election
The ruling Peoples Progressive Party (PPP) as well as the Guyana Government are both questioning the preparedness of the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) to pull off either the Local Government or the General Elections.
These sentiments were yesterday expressed by both the General Secretary of the PPP, Clement Rohee, and Head of the Presidential Secretariat, Dr Roger Luncheon, speaking at different forums.
Rohee during the party’s weekly press engagement at Freedom House yesterday said that the party noted the many public statements calling on government to hold Local Government Elections “however the critical question is GECOM’s readiness.”
Rohee pointed to GECOM’s public pronouncement that enough ground work has been done to ascertain boundaries countrywide for the 585 constituencies which would mean the same number of lists of electors in order to hold Local Government Elections and responded by saying “the PPP is not confident this has been done thoroughly so as to ensure that every eligible voter will be correctly placed on his or her constituency list.”
As a result, Rohee said that the party is calling on GECOM to undertake physical verification within the various communities as well as invite political parties to have their representatives be a part of the process in order to allow a fair and transparent process if and when elections are called.
In seeking to qualify his statements, Rohee used as example the Diamond, Housing Scheme and said that GECOM’s figures for the 2011 elections points to 4,504 persons eligible to vote and GECOM has further opted to disaggregate this list into four smaller separate lists and constituencies.
He said that GECOM had proposed this since 2010 but the plan was aborted based on a request from the Peoples National Congress Reform (PNCR).
According to Rohee, the party is reliably informed that GECOM does not have the separate lists to date.
He noted that since the 6th Cycle of continuous registration has been concluded and the Commission is about to undertake a claims and objections exercise, there is no possibility of Local Government Elections being held by August 1.
Meanwhile Dr Luncheon at a subsequent press engagement at the Office of the President was asked to respond to the fact that the US Diplomats seem set to continue to call for Local Government Elections.
He responded by saying that persons should check with GECOM on their preparedness to hold either election given the stance taken by all of the stakeholders including the diplomatic community.
According to Dr Luncheon the elections commission has to signal its preparedness, “I don’t believe they (are) ready.”
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