…from PNC’s nonsense
Your Eyewitness still can’t get over the PNC’s barefacedness on our Constitution over the consequences of the NCM. And it’s not that they didn’t know beforehand about those consequences. After the 2011 elections the PNC and AFC had those same 33 seats they got in 2015 – which constituted a parliamentary majority. It’s only because our Constitution doesn’t allow a coalition AFTER the elections, that they weren’t allowed to name the President and form the Government!!
So lo and behold, in 2014, Moses Nagamootoo of the AFC (obviously with the tacit approval of the PNC/APNU) cited Art 106 (6) and moved a no-confidence motion (NCM) against the PPP Govt of Donald Ramotar. No one in the PPP cried “dirty pool!” – after all NCMs are a regular feature of parliamentary democracies! In fact when the PPP brought THEIR NCM in 2018, Moses Nagamootoo gloated that the PPP had “cogged” the formulation of HIS motion!!
At no time did the PNC say the NCM wasn’t democratically kosher. In fact, PNC GS Amna Ally famously taunted the PPP in Parliament, “Bring it on, big boy!!” But when the PPP did “bring it on”, after loud wails of “Noooo, Charrandas. Nooooooooo!!!” the PNC has been trampling all over the Constitution to prevent themselves from being booted out by the sovereign Guyanese people. First, it was Charrandas was a dual citizen and his vote didn’t count!! That was thrown out by the High Court; the Appellate Court and the CCJ!!
Then they claimed even if the vote counted, 33 wasn’t the majority of 65 – as it had been since 2011!! They’d bought a snake oil concoction that the requisite process to arrive at that claim – dividing MPs into halves and then reconstituting them again – hadn’t been performed!! The High Court threw that rigmarole into the wastebasket, but two justices of the Appellate Court went along for the ride!! They’ve to be hiding their faces after the CCJ derided the half-man abomination!!
So with their backs against the (constitutional) wall, the PNC’s fallen back on their plan B – counting on GECOM – controlled by their unilaterally appointed chair – to drag out the elections date till next year!! Now what’s the point of the Constitution, if it can dictate the elections be held in three months after an NCM but GECOM can simply snicker, “No way, Jose!!”?? The law may be an ass, but not our Constitution!
GECOM’s been sitting on their hands since Dec because of Granger’s Chair’s intransigence and they cannot now be allowed to cite Art 162 (2) – to delay elections because of “hardship”.
This was brought on by themselves!!
…from the PNC’s white noise
The PNC’s demanding new House-to-House (HtH) Registration – but interestingly, THERE’S ABSOLUTELY NO LAW that supports this demand!!! That’s right!! In 1967, a National Register of Registrants (NRR) from which the Preliminary List of Electors (PLE) is extracted was established from HtH registration. Subsequently, because of PNC’s electoral jiggery pokery over the next two decades, a new NRR was created in time for the 1992 elections registration. But because of the improvement and computerisation of records (such as of deaths) after 2000, the goal was to institutionalise “Continuous Registration” by automatically adding names of persons 14 or older (who are exhorted at scheduled intervals) and eliminating those dead from lists provided by the General Registry Office.
The last HtH registration was in 2008, and as the OL pointed out, there have been two general elections where the PNC didn’t find anyone disenfranchised!! If someone’s not on the list for whatever reason, they can simply have that rectified during the Claims and Objections Period!!
Don’t get confused by the PNC’s white noise!!
…from urbanity
With English-instilled understatement, Senior Counsel Douglas Mendes for the Opposition Leader allowed to the CCJ that he “is YET TO BE SHOWN any law for HtH registration”. And allowed Basil Williams meanderings on HtH.
The PNC don’t know urbanity: “Shut up or put up, Basil!!”
