Proposed amendments to the Representation of the People Act (RoPA) that are currently the subject of national stakeholder consultations, are in no way, shape or form intended to give any political party an advantage at the polls.
This is according to Attorney General Anil Nandlall, SC, when he led presentations during national consultations on electoral reforms that began at the Arthur Chung Conference Centre (ACCC) On Tuesday.
Nandlall stressed that these reforms are not intended to give any political party an electoral advantage. On the contrary, he pointed out that these reforms are much needed changes to the system and are good for democracy.
“The important thing that I want to emphasise here, is that there is not a single proposal on these pieces of paper that are intended to create an electoral advantage for any political party. And I want to stress and emphasise that 100 times,” Nandlall said.
“I’ve said also that if there is any person who can point to me or to us as a collective, a particular provision that creates an electoral advantage for any political party, we are prepared to engage and engage publicly too. The point I’m making is that these reforms are good for the system. They are good for the process. They are good for the country. They are good for democracy.”
The AG went on to give an example of one of the proposed amendments to the Representation of the People Act, which would not favour one party over another. For instance, Section 6 (11) of the RoPA (Amendment) Bill 2022 caps the number of electors that can be assigned to a particular polling station.
“So, there’s a limit. No more than 400 electors are to be assigned to a polling station. No more. You can have less. So right away, you put a cap. So, we don’t have electors lining up in the hot sun. I want you to interrogate this and tell me if it creates any political advantage for any political party.”
“The sun only shines in PPP areas? Or the rain doesn’t fall in certain areas? It’s right across the board. It’s to make electors comfortable, to make voting easy, to give greater accessibility to polling places and polling stations,” Nandlall also said.
Among the issues raised by the attendees was the subdivision of regions. According to Section 6 (A) of the Bill, the polling districts of Region Three (Essequibo Islands-West Demerara), Region Four (Demerara-Mahaica) and Region Six (East Berbice-Corentyne Region) will be divided.
Opposition nominated Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) Commissioner Vincent Alexander argued that this should only be the case in the hinterland, where for the sake of efficiency the districts could be broken up.
“I will argue that if one is speaking about efficiency, then that subdivisions are more pertinent in the hinterland regions (because) these regions have subdistricts that cannot move results overnight,” he said.
However, Nandlall reminded him of the calamitous events that took place in the Region Four polling district during the 2020 General and Regional Election and reminded him that efficiency is not the only consideration. Nandlall noted that this proposed change is to prevent one electoral officer from having too much power over the most populous electoral districts.
The consultation being undertaken has been described as an integral element of the Government of Guyana’s commitment to implement a consultative, inclusive, and participatory process regarding electoral reform.
The Ministry had said in a previous statement that the stakeholder consultation formed part of a continuous consultative process, which began on November 6, 2021, when the Ministry published the draft RoPA (Amendment) Bill on its social media pages.
As such, the public was invited to peruse the draft documents and submit feedback to the Ministry within six weeks; however, after requests for extensions, the Ministry accommodated submissions of feedback well into 2022.
Recommendations were received from a variety of stakeholders including civil society actors, the Guyana Elections Commission, some political parties, and interested individuals and organisations. These recommendations were consolidated and provided to the Attorney General, who in May 2022, facilitated in-person meetings with the respondents.
Updated versions of the RoPA Bill and Regulations have been made available once again, and the new draft amendments to the National Registration Act have also been made accessible for public perusal via a link published on the Ministry’s Facebook pages. To this end, 157 organisations were invited to the consultation on October 25.
These organisations represent a broad cross-section of society including political parties; constitutional bodies; civil society organisations in the labour movement; private sector, faith-based, youth, women, LGBTQ, ethnic/cultural, health and rehabilitation organisations; and other civil society actors.
