On the evening of Election Day, May 11, 2015, an angry mob gathered at the home of Mr Narine Khublall in Sophia shouting that ballot boxes were in the PPP/C command centre which was located there. The team at the command centre was under the leadership of Mr Joseph Hamilton, who was also effectively held hostage by the crowd. He related that at around 5.30pm, someone known to him arrived in a bus and began to call out that the residence was an illegal polling station, but despite attempts being made to disabuse him of this fantasy, he persisted in his claims.
Mr Hamilton further recounted how within fifteen minutes a crowd of about 200 people had assembled from the area, and 45 minutes after that, others were being transported from outside the community in buses and various vehicles. They stoned Mr Khublall’s home as well as that of his neighbour, set eight vehicles alight, including a police motorcycle and one belonging to Mr Hamilton’s son that had only recently been purchased, and burned down a small shack with a horse stable attached to it. Eventually, 30 people and 3 racehorses were trying to shelter from the violence in Mr Khublall’s property. His view was that it was less of a political thing than a criminal one, since they wanted to rob his home and that of his neighbour.
It was not the only violent incident on that night; Mr Anil Nandlall, for example, has made reference to one at Better Hope South where his driver was assaulted by APNU+AFC supporters outside a polling station. However, it was by far the most notable, not just because of its scale, but because various political figures from the coalition side attempted to intervene and failed completely to calm the gathering. First came Mr Freddie Kissoon in company with others who were described as “middle management” APNU+AFC members. At Mr Hamilton’s invitation they were given a tour of the home to reassure themselves that there were no ballot boxes there, and they in turn relayed this fact to those thronged outside. It was to no avail.
Twenty minutes later coalition members Supriya Singh and Clayton Hall arrived, but they fared no better than had their predecessors. Then came heavyweight Raphael Trotman who also did the tour, following which he addressed the angry crowd, but his confirmation was ignored and their numbers continued to swell. Mr Khublall later said the police saved their lives that night. He was probably right.
It is worth reiterating this story for more than one reason. First it was not triggered by any call to track ballot boxes made by coalition politicians on the campaign trail; it seems to have originated at some other level entirely. Secondly, it was organised to the extent that although the initial crowd was formed by sizeable groups milling around two locations not far away whose members just gravitated towards the noise, subsequently people were transported to Sophia from outside the area. Thirdly, and most important, the intervention of APNU+AFC members, one of them very senior who would have been known to all the rioters, was completely ineffectual. In other words, they were powerless to control the situation.
Despite this, we now have APNU executive and PNCR Chair Volda Lawrence telling supporters at Kitty Market Square on Sunday night that after polls have closed at 6 pm on March 2, they must be ready to work the “nightshift”. She went on to tell them: “At 6 o clock, you return to work at the places of polling and you will remain out there and let our staff inside know you are out there … Comrades, you have to remain there until they get it right, until they have counted all ballots and the returning officer comes outside and paste up the statement of polls and then our nice strong men will be mobilised to follow that ballot box for it to go into that container and have the APNU+AFC padlock and chain placed on that container to protect our ballots.”
This was an extraordinary call, not least because it is her own party which historically speaking has been associated with the manipulation of ballots and the diversion of ballot boxes, something which various PPP/C writers have not been laggard about pointing out. But given the whole history of the conduct of elections here and their association with periodic violence engendered by the PNCR, it is nothing less than highly irresponsible for Ms Lawrence to incite her members to assemble outside polling stations until the Statements of Poll have been posted.
She must know what happened in Sophia, and she should know at what level in her party that incident occurred, even although she may not know the specifics of who organised it. But in a situation where the PNCR on account of its ethnic numbers, for many decades could see no way of accessing power through the ballot box, it has always had a hard core of crusaders, some with criminal connections, ever ready to take to the streets and bring other supporters out along with them. Someone with links to this grouping clearly planned and arranged the Sophia violence.
If on that occasion the planning was sub rosa, so to speak, this time there is an official, public call to assemble outside polling stations. Exactly how, therefore, does Ms Lawrence think that the professional crusaders of the PNCR will interpret it? And precisely what does she expect will happen, given the Sophia experience? And if violence does occur, how could she or anyone else in the party stop it, given that as far as the rioters would be concerned, she called for it in the first place.
One might have thought that the year 2015 changed the situation in so far as prima facie it seemed to bring the PNCR into the democratic fold, and demonstrated that it could come to office via electoral means. Certainly the comments on the hustings designed to fuel the most negative feelings in an audience the last time around came from Mr Bharrat Jagdeo, and certainly not from Mr David Granger, or even any of the other leaders of the coalition in comparison. But at that stage APNU had the experience of 2011 behind them to suggest they had a realistic chance of getting into government. In contrast, Ms Lawrence’s emotional urgings to the base this time convey the suggestion – unintentionally, no doubt – of a certain lack of confidence about winning the 2020 election, and possibly the need to fall back on more traditional undemocratic approaches as a kind of Plan B.
It is disturbing that the Private Sector Commission, which has condemned Ms Lawrence’s outburst as “a direct threat to the peaceful conduct of the elections,” has claimed that “similar reports in the media have been attributed to Winston Jordan and Mr. Basil Williams”, although they have supplied no direct or indirect quotes from the two ministers in relation to this. If it is indeed true that other leading figures in government have been exhorting their followers in much the same fashion as the PNCR Chair, then one would have to conclude that this is APNU party policy for the campaign, although whether it encompasses the AFC directly, however, is not clear. Even if it doesn’t, that party will have to decide very quickly whether this policy is acceptable. If it is prepared to let it go, then it will carry the same opprobrium as APNU, and will become disfigured by all the anti-democratic blemishes of the PNCR from an earlier era.
The PSC too, in addition to other commentators, has pointed to the dangers if supporters from the PPP/C happen to confront a crowd from APNU. Suffice it to say that the potential consequences are not of an order that the average voter from any party is in any mood to contemplate.
In our Tuesday report we cited relevant sections from the Representation of the People Act, which, among other things, outlaws any unauthorized person obstructing or interfering with access to, or egress from, a polling place or the movement of documents, supplies and other material pertaining to an election, including ballot boxes and ballot papers.
In other words, what Ms Lawrence is doing is possibly setting her party’s supporters up to commit illegalities which carry hefty sanctions. In the first place, no political party should open itself to the interpretation that it is recommending the commission of a criminal offence, and in the second, it should not be exposing the members of its base in this way. APNU+AFC like all the other parties needs to leave the security of the ballot boxes and the arrangements in relation to the Statements of Poll, etc, in the hands of the legitimate authorities, namely the security forces and Gecom, respectively.
It is clear that both President David Granger and Mr Khemraj Ramjattan need to publicly reject Ms Lawrence’s approach, and instruct all their speakers to advocate only that which is unambiguously lawful.
