GECOM Must Safeguard the Ballot or Face the People’s Wrath

The Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) has to be mindful it is not colluding with the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) or any other force, local or foreign, to rig the 2025 elections. If that happens, the last safeguard of our democracy, the ballot, will be lost. I return to this issue on the belief that it is never too late for good sense to prevail.

We in Guyana know too well the bitter lessons of electoral manipulation and in instance violence, the most recently being the 2020 elections. The people’s right to choose has too often been compromised. Each time, the damage left behind was distrust, division, and instability.

That is why protecting the ballot must be the number one priority. It cannot be business as usual. For years, citizens have been calling for simple, commonsense safeguards, yet GECOM has dragged its feet. The refusal to ban cell phones in the polling booths is one such glaring failure. Allowing voters to enter with cell phones opens the door to intimidation, vote-buying, and manipulation, where people are pressured to prove how they voted. To protect the sanctity of the ballot, cell phones must be banned. Full stop.

Equally troubling is GECOM’s refusal to implement biometric safeguards to verify voters. In an oil-rich nation with billions flowing in, Guyana cannot claim it lacks the resources to introduce technology that many smaller nations already use to protect their elections. This is not a question of capacity but of political will. By failing to act, GECOM is exposing the process to fraud and making itself complicit in the erosion of trust.

Let me make it very clear, the people are not asking for these measures out of luxury, but out of necessity. Citizens have demanded them repeatedly. The absence of action is not because Guyanese do not want safeguards, it is because of the absence of political will and the evident disrespect for the voices of the people.

And let us be reminded, the sanctity of the ballot is tied directly to the struggles of workers. It was the blood, sweat, and sacrifice of the working class that wrested the right to vote from the hands of the colonial elite. Workers stood at the forefront of agitation for universal suffrage, for fair representation, and for a voice in shaping the nation’s destiny. To now undermine that ballot is to spit in the face of every worker who fought to ensure their children and grandchildren could mark an X and have it count. The worker’s struggle is the people’s struggle, and the ballot is the worker’s shield.

GECOM must take full responsibility for ensuring the integrity of the 2025 vote. And GECOM must also be held fully accountable for any fallout if it fails to do so. The integrity of elections cannot be compromised to suit political convenience.

The ballot was won through struggle, sweat, and sacrifice. It must remain sacred. If it is betrayed, it will not be the PPP or any party that wins, only corruption will. And the workers and people of this nation will not forgive it.