AG –Division of Region Four among new proposed amendments to electoral laws

As the process of electoral reform continues, Attorney General and Legal Affairs Minister, Anil
Nandlall, revealed that Region Four will now be sub-divided for better management and
accountability.
Minister Nandlall detailing the major amendments the government has proposed to the
Representation of the People’s Act (ROPA), he revealed that the subdivision of the country’s
largest electoral district is of grave importance. This, the minister said, is being promulgated as
the government seeks to avoid a recurrence of the protracted events between March and August
2020. “District Four is a special district in the electoral equation of our country. It is the most
populated district [and] it always has the greatest number of controversies. So, what we are
proposing in these amendments, is we’re subdividing it into four units; the East Bank, the East
Coast, North Georgetown, South Georgetown,” Nandlall explained. The Attorney General said
that the classification will allow for each subdistrict to operate independently, acting as a district
by itself. “Each one is compartmentalised in terms of staff, infrastructure, regulations, and rules
and systems and procedure, as if it is an electoral district by itself,” he said.
Nandlall said this means that there will be four Returning Officers for the district, which will
also allow for decentralisation and higher levels of accountability within the electoral process.
The AG and Legal Affairs Minister said the main idea behind crafting such an amendment was
the eventful, yet gruesome electoral debacle that ensued after former Region Four Returning
Officer, Clairmont Mingo, inflated and deflated the number of votes, while they were under his
purview. Minister Nandlall stressed that the amendment, will ensure that such an event ever
recurs. “When you have them together, we saw first hand what the possibilities are for
wickedness,” he said.
Nandlall declared that the criteria for the selection of polling stations have also been outlined in
the government’s proposed amendments to the Act. “We know what are the criteria that will be
used to establish a polling station within a division. What factors will be taken into account, we
have to look at the number of voters likely to vote there…we have to look at the distance that a
voter has to travel to arrive at the polling station, [and]…the natural environment of the polling
station,” he stressed. The AG noted further that there are specific amendments that allow for
such achievement. This, he argued, will be realised through the enforcement of the publication of
Statements of Poll (SOPs), once the amendments are passed in the National Assembly. “Upon
receipt of the Statements of Poll by the CEO and… the Chairman of the [Guyana Elections
Commission] …they must be posted by law, on the GECOM website, where the whole world
will see,” he said.
Minister Nandlall said though the law had once prescribed for these documents to be affixed to a
building, the government must now embrace the technological advancement readily available via
the internet. “The idea behind the law was to make the results public as quickly as
possible…now we have the magnificence of a technology called internet,” he explained. He said
further that the newly proposed alterations clarify what document must be used for the tabulation
of votes by the Chief Elections Officer. “When the tabulated forms are transmitted from the
respective Returning Officers to the CEO, those tabulated forms are the only basis for him to

come to use in the computation of his results, and that becomes the…final results which he is to
put in that report and give to the commission,” the AG pointed out.
The Minister said many other areas addressed in the amendment are now before civil society for
consultation. He added that upon the completion of the public consultation, the Attorney General
will take the proposed amendments to the National Assembly.