The Council for Hemispheric Affairs has issued a report by Tristan Mohabir about the upcoming elections in Guyana. Here are some excerpts. Please follow the link below for the complete report.

As Guyana prepares for its upcoming parliamentary elections, tensions between its two major political parties ride high.  The People’s Progressive Party (PPP) and the People’s National Congress (PNC), bitter adversaries since their inception in the 1950s, are the main contenders for the presidency, with the majority party’s presidential candidate assuming office.  Guyana, a small nation of fewer than 800,000 people, is a former British colony and South America’s lone English-speaking country.[i] The ramifications of British colonial influence have played a significant role in the development of the country’s turbulent post-independence political profile.  Racial tensions often have ignited widespread riots and violence, and citizens are increasingly voting along strictly ethnic lines.  To better understand the contemporary nature of Guyanese politics, it is worth examining how the nation arrived at its current state.

. . .

Current Conditions

President Jagdeo, who is constitutionally barred from seeking a third term, will be leaving a mixed legacy behind him.  On the economic front, Guyana is growing quickly.  The country’s GDP growth is expected to be 4.5 percent in 2011 and 4.0 percent in 2012, up from 3.6 percent in 2010.[xvi] Despite such relatively robust growth, Guyana has one of the lowest GDP per capita rates in the Caribbean, at only USD 2,629.28 in 2009.[xvii] Political transparency is also weak.  According to Transparency International’s 2010 Corruption Perceptions Index, Guyana scores a 2.7 out of 10, one of the lowest ratings in the Caribbean and South America.[xviii]

The PPP also has been accused of turning a blind eye to corruption. For example, in the multi-million dollar “Polar Beer Scam,” beer was smuggled into the country and then passed off as soda so as to avoid higher tariffs. The Guyana Revenue Authority was thought to be complicit in the crime, but all 72 charges leveled against 15 of its employees were eventually dropped.[xix] Yet another major problem facing the country is that of “brain drain,” or skilled workers leaving; over 70 percent of Guyanese with tertiary educations leave the country, usually heading for the United States and Britain.[xx]

As the Latin America Monitor observes, “President Bharrat Jagdeo’s sound macroeconomic management and astute diplomacy are boosting Guyana’s prominence…[but the country still suffers from] structural issues ranging from wide ethnic divisions to a relatively weak constitutional framework.”[xxi] Thus, while Jagdeo has presided over various improvements, most notably economic growth, his administration has been marred by corruption and inefficiency.

The Usual Suspects

With elections expected to be held by mid-October, the PPP and PNC will again be the main contenders.  As the PPP draws its support largely from the Indo-Guyanese population, rural rice farmers and sugar workers will comprise a large portion of the party’s defenders.  The PNC, meanwhile, has its base in urban in areas such as Georgetown, the capital.  The largest challenge facing the PPP is that for the first time in its history, the party will not have the face of a Jagan—the nation’s uncontested royal family—behind it, although its candidates will surely invoke the spirit of that lordly family.

The PPP’s presidential candidate is Donald Ramotar, the current General Secretary of the party and an economist by training.  Ramotar has represented the party abroad on numerous occasions, at times accompanying President Jagdeo.  Originally the frontrunner for the PPP nomination, which is determined by secret ballot among the central committee’s 35 members, Ramotar was granted a de facto victory after his three rival candidates withdrew.  His nomination further added to speculation that he is Jagdeo’s candidate of choice and drew accusations of political manipulation from the PPP’s opposition.[xxii] Ramotar has said that his administration would be one of continuity, and while offering no specifics, he advocates an export-oriented economic policy, investment in alternative energy sources, education reform and improved public security.[xxiii]

The PNC’s candidate is David Granger, former Brigadier and commander of the Guyana Defence Force, the country’s military.  Granger holds a Bachelor’s Degree in history and a Master’s in political science and was a Hubert Humphrey fellow at the University of Maryland.  He narrowly won his party’s nomination by garnering 279 delegate votes, beating out Carl Greenidge, who secured 264.[xxiv]Granger’s main concerns are improving public security, reforming the education system, economic development and fostering a sense of national unity that would alleviate the country’s pervasive racial strife.  He also supports constitutional reform that would make the prime minister the head of government and the reintroduction of a non-militarized national service.[xxv]

The soft-spoken Granger, who is quick to distinguish himself from career politicians, seeks to tackle education reform by providing increased funding through taxation for the University of Guyana and raising teachers’ salaries and incentives so as to induce them to remain in the country.  To attract investment, Granger seeks to set up a Department of the Diaspora, which would allow expatriates to return and become integrated without encountering superfluous red tape.  He also supports microcredit financing to spur small business growth.[xxvi]

Expectations

If apan jhat continues, it is difficult to envision the PPP losing the elections.  Not only does the party benefit from high voter turnout, but it has also strengthened its support among Amerindians by committing resources to infrastructural development in their communities.  Additionally, incumbency grants the party the advantage of being able to undertake new or delayed projects in communities where it seeks to fortify its political standing.  Yet another advantage the PPP enjoys is the support of some 50,000 to 60,000 sugar and rice factory workers, who might be disinclined to retract their support for the party that historically has backed them.[xxvii]

Despite these advantages, the PPP will likely encounter much stiffer electoral resistance than it has in previous years.  Granger will not be running solely under the banner of the PNC, but rather will represent a coalition of opposition parties, including Walter Rodney’s WPA, deemed A Partnership for National Unity.[xxviii] The primary challenge facing the party is retaining its Afro-Guyanese support while also articulating policies that will attract a number of crossover Indo-Guyanese votes.  The wild card that could swing the race is the Alliance for Change (AFC), the second-largest opposition party after the PNC.  According to Granger campaign worker Derrick Lawrence, “we can’t have a discussion on politics and ignore the AFC,” as he claims the party receives about 20 percent of the opposition vote.[xxix] That number, however, may be rapidly growing.

Khemraj Ramjattan, former president of the Guyana Bar Association and the AFC’s presidential candidate, has stated that the party will align with neither the PPP nor the PNC in order to stay true to its bipartisan and nonracial tenets.[xxx] Furthermore, even if the AFC joins the opposition party, there is no guarantee that the former would have a voice in the coalition government.  Additionally, the AFC leader believes that maintaining this independence will win the support of disaffected PPP and PNC supporters.  Ramjattan, who was expelled from the PPP in 2004 for denouncing its corruption and its leftist ideological position, formed the AFC with former PNC member Raphael Trotman in 2005.[xxxi]Ramjattan has worked closely with both the PPP and PNC, but regards “both as equal evils because of race-based politics,” reflective of his commitment to racial harmony.[xxxii]

The AFC aims to bridge Guyana’s racial divide and bring back government transparency.  To discourage the development of a maximalist leader, Ramjattan has promised that should the AFC win the government, he and prime ministerial candidate Sheila Holder would switch positions midway through his term.[xxxiii] To spur investment, he proposes reducing corporate taxes and establishing a state development bank to manage and provide capital to prospective businessmen.  Ramjattan’s plan to address crime in Guyana centers around renewing offers from the UK to have Scotland Yard train Guyanese policemen and the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration to help combat narco-trafficking in the country.  Despite the AFC’s solid, progressive platform and Ramjattan’s own belief that “[the party] has every chance to win the government,” what remains to be seen is whether the Guyanese electorate will have the pluck to break with the country’s traditional power brokers, the PPP and PNC.[xxxiv]

As the elections draw near, each party is becoming more forceful in its call to action.  President Jagdeo recently implicated Granger in the PNC political intimidation of the 1970s, while Granger, echoing Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign, has stressed the need to break away from one-party rule in search of change.  Regardless of who wins the elections, the next Guyanese president must focus on changing the same old story—managing the tide of racial division in the Land of Many Waters.

References for this article can be found here.

For the complete report go to http://www.coha.org/uncharted-territory-in-guyanese-legislative-elections/