The elections and GECOM

Feb 22, 2019 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

The Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) cannot be absolved from responsibility for frustrating the intent of the Constitution in relation to the passage of no-confidence vote. GECOM’s actions since December 21, 2018 have done little to ensure that the 90-day deadline can be met.
GECOM is subservient to the Constitution. This means that if the Constitution says that elections should be held within 90 days of the passage of a no-confidence motion, it is for GECOM to put itself in a state of readiness to ensure that elections are held by that deadline.
GECOM does not have to wait on the government to put itself in a state of readiness. It should have been ready all along.
GECOM does not set the date for elections. It is the President who has to do this. But the President can only do this on the basis of advice from GECOM. The President cannot go ahead and set a date unless he is sure that GECOM is in a state of readiness.
GECOM’s non-readiness to bring off the elections within three months cannot be factored out of the decision of the President. In other words, the President can only set a date if he is certain that GECOM will be ready for that date.
The Leader of the Opposition blundered during his meeting with the President in January. There was no need for him to agree to have the Chief Whips inquire as the readiness of GECOM to hold elections. Instead he should have pressed for the President to write to GECOM immediately enquiring as to its readiness.
GECOM’s timelines for the holding of elections this year have attracted caustic criticism. The Stabroek News in a front page comment yesterday lambasted GECOM. It noted that GECOM has not been able to provide a convincing explanation as to why elections could not be held in three months given that there exists a valid voters’ list which was used as recent at November 12, 2018 for local government elections.
The timetable presented to GECOM by the Chief Election Officer was also assailed. GECOM’s timelines indicate that it has gone off the tracks.
To say that 148 days is necessary for elections is an indication that GECOM has lost its way. And in so doing it will lose the confidence of the Guyanese people, if it has not done so already.
As things stand, the March 19 deadline is going to be achieved one way or the other. And this means that a constitutional crisis is going to exist because the government has no mandate to continue after that date unless there is an extension of the 90-day period by two-thirds of the members of the National Assembly.
In such circumstances the APNU+AFC government would be in office in contravention of the Constitution. This is a road which Guyana has never before gone down.
Unless the National Assembly grants this extension, then the international community will have no option but to halt the disbursement of loans and grants to the country. A number of technical assistance programmes are going to be affected and all those persons working with government who are being paid via international funds will not likely be paid.
Ministers of the government will no longer be able to be granted visas for international travel by virtue of their governmental office. They will have to apply in the private capacities for visas.
A messy situation awaits the nation and GECOM cannot wash its hands of responsibility. It should have been ready for the holding of elections.
That it is not ready will result in a further loss of confidence in its ability and, given Guyana’s polarized political environment, there will be questions over its impartiality.
The international community is obviously concerned. This is why it is keeping itself informed about developments.
The international community should offer to undertake a technical review of GECOM’s timelines to determine the earliest date by which elections can be held. The international community may also wish to offer to conduct a quick-test of the integrity of the voters’ list to establish whether it is so defective as to render it unusable for elections before July 2019.

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