Just over 200 government supporters yesterday protested near the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) to demand that house-to-house registration be conducted before the next general and regional elections are held.
“No registration! No election! The youth must vote!” were the chants of those gathered in the vicinity of the commission’s Kingston, Georgetown headquarters during the lunch-time protest.
The protestors, who included four government ministers, the Georgetown Mayor and several city councillors, were prevented by police from protesting in front of the GECOM building on High Street, Kingston as barricades were placed along High Street at the intersections with Lamaha and Cowan streets. They, however, maximized the space between the barricades and the Ministry of Finance as they proclaimed their position.
PNCR Vice-Chairperson and Minister within the Ministry of Public Infrastructure Annette Ferguson explained that the protest “should send a strong message not just to GECOM but also to the Opposition Leader that we are ready for any elections but before we go to the poll our young people who are eligible must have an opportunity for their names to be presented on the list so that when elections are called they will have an opportunity to vote solidly for the APNU+AFC coalition.”
Ferguson urged the protestors to maintain hope and faith in the governing coalition, while stating that over the last three years they have done much to bring about desired change and create the good life but they “must have a second term” to finish the work.
Chairman of the Alliance for Change and Minister of Public Security Khemraj Ramjattan was also present to show his preference for house-to-house registration. According to Ramjattan, the ministers showed up at the behest of their supporters, who feel they would be disenfranchised if elections were held without house-to-house registration. “It is the decision of GECOM to ensure that everybody who is supposed to be enfranchised is enfranchised and since we set aside $3 billion for house-to-house we should have it,” he stressed.
He further said that he “would like the list to be cleansed of all the dead people and those who are not residents.
“I would like also the residency requirement… because a lot of people have shifted out from say from Port Mourant to Parfaite Harmonie; they must be allowed to vote in Parfaite Harmonie instead of Port Mourant. That is an important requirement because you might get them disenfranchised because on the morning they do not turn up at elections because they have to go til’ Port Mourant,” Ramjattan said, before adding that the if the coalition were to win an election with the current list, the same opposition “gonna say it’s rigged elections.”
Also at the protest was PNCR Executive and Minister of Communities Ronald Bulkan, who noted that “we cannot have an acceptable list without house-to-house registration. The list is bloated. House-to-house registration is prerequisite to produce a list that is properly sanitised of person who do not live here or are dead,” he said.
Both ministers maintained that a claims and objection period would not be enough to “purge the list” to the degree necessary.
