Joseph Harmon
October 31 ,2020
Leader of the Opposition Joseph Harmon has once again called for the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) to be allocated the funds that will allow it to begin preparing for local government polls next year.
“I take this opportunity to call on the PPP regime to begin preparations for the holding of Local Government Elections in 2021 and to allocate in the National Budget adequate funding to GECOM for the hosting of those elections,” Harmon said yesterday during a meeting with the Region 10 Regional Democratic Council (RDC) at Watooka House in Linden.
According to Harmon, it is also necessary that there be sufficient allocations for the urgent commencement of house-to-house registration to create a new electoral register.
“The preparations for house-to-house registration can begin now and I call on GECOM to put itself in a state of readiness to begin the process,” he added.
The politician stressed that polls are critical to democracy, while accusing the PPP/C of intending to wield authoritarian power through Central Government.
“The APNU+AFC takes serious umbrage to statements made by Irfaan Ali to the effect that [local government elections], which [are] constitutionally due in 2021 will not be held until GECOM is fixed to his party’s satisfaction-not the people of Guyana’s satisfaction,” he told the councillors, while repeating that there will be serious resistance to any efforts to delay elections.
On Monday, Ali told reporters that the polls will not be held until the issues which are currently affecting GECOM are fixed.
“…What we have to do is to fix what is there first and we have to ensure that we have a system that is working and a system that people trust and a system that is professional and a system that operates in an unbiased manner so that the people of our country can contribute,” Ali said.
A similar sentiment was expressed by Attorney General Anil Nandlall, who told Stabroek News that the holding of the polls next year seems unlikely given the current elections petitions, a call by the opposition for a new voters’ list and police probes of officers of the electoral body.
“By law, local government elections are due next year, but from all indications it does not appear that GECOM will be in a state of readiness for several reasons…,” Nandlall had said.
Nandlall stated that not only is GECOM’s Chief Election Officer (CEO) Keith Lowenfield before the court, but that his party has no confidence in him again performing such functions at the electoral body.
The polls are supposed to be held every three years. Under successive PPP/C governments, they were not held for some two decades. It was not until the APNU+AFC coalition took office in 2015, that polls were held in 2016 and then 2018.
In the absence of the elections, Harmon said, the PPP under its former Local Government Ministers went around the country and dismissed elected Neigh-bourhood Democratic Councils and installed in their places hand-picked Interim Management Committees (IMCs). “These IMC’s answered directly to Freedom House. You were not spared. We had an IMC installed here in Linden, subverting the will of the people. We will have no more of that my dear Guyanese sisters and brothers. This will not be condoned,” he said
Harmon reminded that Article 71 of the Constitution provides that local government is a vital aspect of democracy and shall be organised so as to involve as many people as possible in the task of managing and developing the communities in which they live. The same article states that Parliament shall provide for a countrywide system of local government through the establishment of organs of local democratic power as an integral part of the political organisation of the state.
He noted that the Municipal and District Council Act provides that the elections be held every three years.
While this Act only addresses elections in municipalities, a series of amendments passed unanimously in 2018 have amended the Local Authorities (Elections) Act to harmonise the period for election of councillors of NDCs with that of councillors of municipalities.
The amendments provide that elections shall be held once every three years on any date during November 1st to December 7th of the third year, counting from the year in which the term of office of the council started, which date shall be appointed by an order of the Minister of Communities (Local Government).
“What Irfaan Ali is proposing is again an abandonment of constitutionally guaranteed Local Government Elections which is critical to Democratic renewal. This is being constantly repeated by his Attorney General. These are more compelling signs that the PPP regime is intent on going back to their days of dictatorship in Guyana. I am sending this clear signal to all the people of Guyana will resist a dictatorship of the PPP. Local Government Elections must be held,” he concluded.