Guyanese votes held hostage – Dr David Lewis

Former Assistant United States Secretary of State for Caribbean Development in Puerto Rico, Dr David Lewis, in an opinion piece published in the Miami Herald, said a constitutional crisis loomed over Guyana as the will of the people was being held hostage.

Dr Lewis, in the piece published on Wednesday, said that Guyana has been in a prolonged constitutional crisis since December 2018. “That’s when the Government of President David Granger and his ruling coalition, A Partnership for National Unity/Alliance For Change (APNU/AFC) lost a No-Confidence Motion (NCM) vote against it in the National Assembly, then failed to step down within three months as mandated by the Constitution and a ruling of the regional Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ).”
He added that the constitutional crisis endured throughout all of 2019, with various legal disputes, and effectively launched the country into an election campaign. Eventually, per a Supreme Court decision, General and Regional Elections were held on March 2, 2020. “Those elections were held, but three months later, remain undecided,” Dr Lewis said in his article.
Dr Lewis is Vice President of Manchester Trade Ltd, an international business advisory firm in Washington, DC and also an adjunct professor at the Florida International University (FIU) School of Business.
He said following the massive offshore discoveries in Guyana, one hoped that betterment would have come. However, it is five years later and those “hopes are on the verge of turning to despair as a persistent political conflict sparked by the ruling party threatens to deteriorate into a full-blown democratic crisis”.
According to the votes tabulated on the night of the March 2, 2020 General and Regional Elections, the APNU/AFC Government was headed for defeat with the Opposition People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) headed for a clear victory.
“But, in a highly unusual move, election authorities delayed posting the results for the country’s most populous voting district, known as Region Four. All previous elections in Guyana have been determined by the voter turnout in this area. As Region Four goes, so goes the election victory. Region Four voters were effectively and arbitrarily disenfranchised by the Guyana Elections Commission.
“Despite strong criticism from domestic and international observers for a lack of transparency, the Elections Commission released results to the media on March 13. The results show a win by the APNU–AFC coalition by 59,077 votes, which would give APNU/AFC a one-seat majority in the National Assembly,” Dr Lewis noted.
He, explained to his readers, that the various international observer missions, including the European Union; Organisation of American States (OAS); the Commonwealth and the Carter Center concluded that “the tabulation of results for the election in Region Four was interrupted and remains incomplete”.
The United States, United Kingdom, European Union and Canada have monitored the process closely. They have made clear to all parties, including the Elections Commission, the need for a free and fair transparent recount process to ensure the legitimacy of the victor and the subsequent government.
Clearly following the process as well, Dr Lewis wrote that following the court battles and decisions, the current recount was integral in expressing the will of the people. He saved no words for GECOM which he noted could not even meet its own 25-day deadline for the recount. Moving on, he is hopeful that the anticipated June 16 declaration comes to fore and the results of the elections would be announced.
“The Opposition has expressed “grave doubt” concerning the lack of transparency in the process so far and questioned the Commission’s credibility in conducting the recount fairly and transparently. The recount observation process includes only one high-level three-person delegation from Caricom and a local OAS presence — enough to cover only a fraction of the counting stations. The Granger Government denied requests by the Carter Center to return to observe the recount.
“Suspicion is that the Granger Government wants to cling to power because of the revenue experts project will be generated by ExxonMobil for oil exploration in a series of offshore wells being developed. As a result of the oil windfall, the World Bank projects Guyana’s GDP [Gross Domestic Product] will grow by 51.7 per cent in 2020 and the International Monetary Fund predicts that by 2030, the Government’s share of earnings from oil could reach $10 billion in real terms. The figure is more than twice the country’s current GDP,” he explained.

Democratic breakdown
Dr Lewis noted that Guyanese people were unlikely to benefit as long as the country remained mired in a political crisis with a disputed Government in power warning that it has all the makings of another democratic breakdown as witnessed next door in Venezuela.
“The international community has an essential role to play in demanding and accepting nothing less than a transparent and credible recount process to ensure the will of the Guyanese people is honoured in their next government. Guyana stands at the threshold of an entirely new future. Its people deserve political leadership that looks to the common good over narrow interests,” Dr Lewis posited.