Sir Ronald Sanders is a business executive and former Caribbean diplomat who publishes widely on small states in the global community. Reponses to: ronaldsanders29@hotmail.com

While power-sharing by the political parties elected to the Guyana Parliament would be the most desirable outcome of General Elections that are constitutionally due, and may be held, by early September, the overriding concern must be that the elections are endorsed by all the political parties and independent observer missions as free and fair.

If the elections are not regarded as free of voter manipulation, the opposition parties will not accept the result, and this could lead to protests and demonstrations in the streets. One incident could ignite civil commotion and confrontation.

Guyana has laboured long under the strain of division between its two main political parties, the Peoples Progressive Party/Civic (PPC/C) and the Peoples National Congress/Reform (PNC/R) who count their core supporters among the East Indian and African communities respectively. In the past, the racial division has spilled into violence.

It is not in the interest of Guyana, CARICOM and the Hemisphere for civil strife to erupt. Already a Highly Indebted Poor Country (HPIC), with the second lowest per capita income in the Caribbean, the country’s economy would sink to even lower depths, as new investment turns away and existing investors apply brakes to their businesses.

The effect of an unstable country within the CARICOM fold and in the Hemisphere is a prospect that neither governments nor business people want, particularly at a time when CARICOM countries host the World Cup Cricket tournament with its already challenging security issues. Guyana, itself, is scheduled to be the venue for some of these games.

Working with CARICOM governments, the major countries in the Hemisphere, especially Canada and the US, should do all in their power, bilaterally and through the Organisation of American States (OAS), to encourage President Bharrat Jagdeo of the PPP/C, Robert Corbin of the PNC/R, and the leaders of other political parties to sit down and work out agreed modalities for holding the general elections.

This has become absolutely necessary because it is widely acknowledged in Guyana that the voters’ list is seriously flawed containing names of people who are known to be dead or to have migrated.

Having started with an unverified list from the 2001 elections, the register of voters, prepared by the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM), remains defective and opens the possibility for fraud.

It is now too late to verify the voters’ list, and while it will undoubtedly be challenged in the Courts, a delay in the election, should the Court grant it, could entail Mr Jagdeo governing by Presidential fiat – a prospect that neither he nor anyone else would welcome.

In any event, delaying the election will intensify apprehension and suspicion among the political parties and their supporters and create space for trouble. It may be best, therefore, to hold the elections but to do so with modalities in place that give all the contending parties comfort that the result will be a genuine reflection of the will of the majority of people who are entitled to vote.

There is good reason why CARICOM should insist on playing a role in getting all the political parties in Guyana to agree on the procedures for voting that will allow voters to be matched and verified from a list of the polling district in which they vote. Guyana is CARICOM’s largest territory and in the Caribbean Single Market (CSM), the exploitation of Guyana’s vast resources becomes available to the region as a whole.

A stable and revitalized Guyana offers the Caribbean people the chance to establish businesses and take up employment.

Western Hemisphere nations, particularly Canada and the US, through the OAS, financed the work of GECOM in the main. They have a right to be convinced that the preparation of the voters’ list that they funded was effectively done. And, since it is clear that the list is defective, the Hemispheric nations should require that, at the very least, modalities agreed by the major contending parties are established for holding the elections.

One element in such modalities would be more funds allocated through the OAS to train and accredit teams of local people who could be sent to every polling station across the country to scrutinise and endorse the voting process from the casting of the first vote to the counting of the last ballot. In other words to ensure that the persons casting votes are registered in the polling place and that the number of voters matches the number of votes cast.

It would be far better for countries such as the US, UK and Canada to allocate a little more money now to establish a process that commands consensus, than to pay much more to recover the country from further deterioration.

While CARICOM, the Commonwealth and the OAS have already indicated that they will send missions to observe the elections, it will take more than these missions to satisfy contending political parties that the elections process is fair. The foreign missions need to be augmented by teams of trained and independent local observers stationed at each polling station.

The Commonwealth Secretary-General, Don McKinnon, hinted at a press conference in the Caribbean last week that he may be willing to send his special envoy, Sir Paul Reeves, back to Guyana to talk to the political leaders to see if, even at this late stage, a consensus might be developed on the general election.

Sir Paul has been playing a facilitator’s role in trying to promote a consensus among the parties for the conduct of the general election. So far, his efforts have reaped no great reward.

But, worry about what will happen after the election is rife throughout Guyana, and the political parties must themselves be deeply concerned.

In this context, the time is ripe for Western Hemisphere governments and CARICOM States to strengthen Sir Paul’s hand by giving him and the Commonwealth Secretariat, the muscle and the means to offer a process for conducting and monitoring the election in which there could be confidence.

Whatever the elections result, power sharing by the political parties elected to parliament remains Guyana’s best hope and salvation, but this election hurdle has to be jumped successfully.