According to the Guyana Elec-tions Commission (GECOM) everything is set for today’s historic local government elections.
Public Relations Officer Tamara Rodney told Stabroek News yesterday that sensitive and non-sensitive polling day material have been sorted and distribution to outlying regions has begun.
“Material for outlying regions were sent by plane early today and those Georgetown and areas close by will be transported from 3 am tomorrow (today),” she said.
According to Rodney, GECOM is not expecting any major issues today as polling day staff have been rigorously trained and all necessary support systems are in place.
She added that as a final measure of preparation polling staff across the country were yesterday engaged in mock voting exercises to sharpen their skills.
Today, 507,633 eligible voters can go to the polls to elect councilors for their respective Local Government Authority (LGA) . This is the first time any Guyanese under the age of 40 will participate in this exercise as the last local government elections were held in 1994.
It is also the first time in independent Guyana that voters will directly elect their representatives in a First past the post system.
50% of the seats available in the 71 LGA will be won through this system. That represents 585 seats.
The occupants of 150 of those seats are already known as those constituencies have only one contesting candidate. By the end of today voters will have selected the other 435.
They will have also under the proportional representation system selected a precise combination of political groups to govern the 9 municipalities and 62 neighbourhood democratic councils (NDCs) by occupying the other 50% of seats.
GECOM has said that three political parties and 17 voluntary groups are contesting in these elections.
