By Mark DaCosta- A legal dispute has reportedly arisen regarding the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) handling of a seat in the National Assembly, sparking questions about whether the commission made a legal error by allowing The New Movement (TNM) to occupy it. The seat was vacated following the resignation of Lenox Shuman, a representative of the Liberty and Justice Party (LJP). This issue hinges on the interpretation of electoral laws and the way the seat was allocated within the coalition of smaller parties.
GECOM, led by Chairperson ret’d Justice Claudette Singh, has come under scrutiny after legal experts reportedly questioned the propriety of the commission’s decision. Kurt Da Silva, GECOM’s Legal Officer, pointed out that the Representation of the People Act, which governs elections and seat allocation, stipulates that only the LJP should have been eligible to fill the vacant seat, not TNM.
According to Da Silva, the error stemmed from how the seat was allocated within the coalition that included LJP, TNM, and A New and United Guyana (ANUG). This coalition was formed ahead of the 2020 elections as a strategic move to increase their chances of winning parliamentary representation. However, despite the combined total of 5,214 votes earned by the coalition, only one seat was secured. Under the agreement made between the three parties, this single seat was to rotate among them based on an MOU. While this arrangement was agreed upon by all parties, it appears the method of rotating the seat may have been legally flawed.
Da Silva explained that under normal circumstances of law, the seat should have gone to the party with the highest number of votes. “If it is one seat, the party with the most votes gets that seat for the entire period,” he explained. Since the LJP had secured the highest number of votes within the coalition, it should have been the LJP’s responsibility to provide a new representative after Shuman’s resignation. However, instead of pulling from the LJP’s list of representatives, GECOM may have mistakenly allowed TNM to take the seat.
The mistake became more apparent when Dr Asha Kissoon, the embattled leader of TNM, was appointed to fill the vacancy, despite TNM having garnered only 244 votes, the fewest among the coalition partners. This led to a situation where Kissoon occupied the seat for a brief period before she refused to vacate it, even when pressure mounted for her to relinquish the seat in favour of ANUG, the next party in line based on the coalition’s agreed-upon rotation.
It is being reported that Da Silva pointed out that the proper process would have involved the Speaker of the National Assembly requesting the name of the next representative from the LJP’s list. “Once there is a vacancy in the 65-Member National Assembly, the Speaker initiates the process by writing the Representative of a Party’s List, and obtaining its extraction,” Da Silva explained. However, GECOM failed to inform the Speaker that the new representative should come from the LJP’s list.
The controversy surrounding Kissoon’s appointment to the seat has prompted several parties, including ANUG, to call for her to step down. ANUG, while vocal about the issue, has not yet taken any formal legal action to challenge the matter in court. Meanwhile, the issue continues to remain on the agenda of GECOM, with the commission promising to address the situation in due course. Deputy Chief Elections Officer (DCEO), Aneal Giddings, reportedly assured the public that the matter is being taken seriously, though he refrained from offering any definitive opinion on the next steps.
GECOM Chairperson ret’d Justice Claudette Singh has remained somewhat silent on the issue, noting that while the matter was raised before the commission, it had yet to be fully discussed or resolved. “That matter went before the Commission and they said nothing. So, there is another step I am thinking of that I don’t want to divulge but there is another step,” Singh stated, leaving many to wonder about the commission’s next move.
To understand the context of this situation, it is important to consider the coalition arrangement that preceded the 2020 elections. In a bid to strengthen their political presence, LJP, TNM, and ANUG formed a coalition, securing a combined total of 5,214 votes. This was enough for them to win one seat in Parliament, but due to their limited representation, the parties agreed to a rotation system as outlined in a Memorandum of Understanding. Under this arrangement, each party would take turns holding the seat, thereby allowing each one to have a voice in the National Assembly despite their small individual voter base. The fallout from this apparently flawed process has now led to legal debates that may have lasting implications for the country’s electoral laws.
