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Following preliminary elections results…Guyanese need to identify themselves as Guyanese – UN
Following yesterday’s release of the preliminary results from Guyana’s regional and general elections from the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM), which show that the A Partnership for National Unity plus Alliance For Change (APNU+AFC)
United Nations Resident Coordinator, Khadija Musa
coalition is on track to form the country’s new government, it is important for citizens to view themselves as Guyanese without divisive racial identities.
This is according to the United Nations (UN) Resident Coordinator, Khadija Musa, who in an interview with Kaieteur News, shortly after the results were revealed, emphasised the importance of a unified Guyana with one national identity as the country moves forward in forming its new government.
“It is very important for Guyanese to think of themselves as Guyanese and not Indo-Guyanese, Afro-Guyanese, Amerindian-Guyanese, Portuguese-Guyanese or whatever their background is,” said the UN official. She added that these elections present a huge opportunity for citizens to market a “full identity” as Guyanese.
Musa said that in moving forward, following the preliminary results, political stakeholders need to focus on unifying the country. “They (stakeholders) need to bring all the country’s people together, through political parties, and through an inclusive government,” Musa related.
GECOM’s preliminary results for this year’s elections had the APNU+AFC leading with 206,324 votes versus the People’s Progressive Party/Civic’s (PPP/C) 201,457 in the general polls. When declarations are made official by GECOM’s Chairman, Dr Steve Surujbally, this would mean that the newly formed Coalition party will form Guyana’s new government, with the party holding the majority of seats in the National Assembly.
In light of the soon to be formed government, Musa said that the UN is open to cooperating with the new administration. She explained that the officially declared government will set their plans and goals for the country, which the UN will then consider and see how best they can help in this regard.
“We can advise in governance and other development areas,” said Musa, as she highlighted areas in the country’s governance that could be improved, namely Local Government.
“As you know Guyana has a lot of areas of governance that are not fully implemented. The country needs to do Local Government (Elections), which needs a structure,” said Musa, “there’s a lot of training that will be required. We (the UN) can help in capacity building, so it is a lot.”
Additionally, the UN representative also commented on the view that the country needs to reform its electoral laws with relation to the transmission of results. As observer missions disclose their various reports on the recent elections, a common observation made by them was the country’s need to amend electoral laws to hasten the transmission of election results.
“Every country needs to update (their electoral laws) because there is better technology available and things can be improved constantly,” related Musa. She said that while the current laws are Guyana’s way of conducting elections, the country can look to other countries, like India, for recommendations on how best to amend them.
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