Dear Editor,
The ongoing debate on dual citizenship continues to evoke mixed reactions from all Guyanese. I wrote on this many moons ago suggesting that the article barring dual citizens be removed from the Constitution. Having considered it again given the current situation, my position has changed slightly.
My previous and current argument is that as Guyanese, we depend on our diaspora for assistance both at an individual level and at a national level. Family depend on family members, political parties and successive Government of Guyana administrations depend on persons and organisations overseas to lobby the government in the country they live in on behalf of political parties, especially those parties in opposition. With elections imminent, political parties will depend on the diaspora for campaign financing. To exclude someone with dual citizenship is a demonstration of ungratefulness.
I do not know when the article barring persons from being MPs if they hold dual citizenship was introduced. Perhaps it was a petty act after Janet Jagan became president of the Republic? Perhaps Ramkarran or Ram can answer when this change was made to the Constitution? Perhaps it was part of the 1980 Constitution from the inception?
Having reconsidered my earlier position, I now suggest the article in the Constitution be modified to allow persons with dual citizenship to sit as MPs but exclude those persons from holding the office or acting as president or prime minister. Guyana is a small country. Half the population lives in Canada, USA, and the UK. After all, none of the presidents or prime ministers who previously held office were born in Guyana. Really, it’s true. With the exception of Janet Jagan who was born in the USA, all the others were born in British Guiana. Guyana was owned by Britain then so it was a colony of Britain and not a country.
Several changes I want to see during constitutional reform along with the one above are a fixed date for elections every five years, that the president is elected from the party with the largest bloc of votes but with a portfolio limited to foreign affairs and the army, that political parties can collate to form a government after elections with the Prime Minister as head of government, and finally, to allow the Prime Minister to appoint more than the two technocrat ministers that are currently allowed. The latter will allow the head of government to appoint competent administrators as ministers instead of being forced to use from the stock of MPs, some of whom cannot speak properly, cannot write properly, have no tertiary qualifications and have no management experience.
Yours faithfully,
Harrish Singh
