I do not understand Mr Ralph Ramkarran’s rationale for his article on overseas voting, although he seemed to suggest that he is against it. I am not certain whether he is calling for its removal from the constitution.
While he is right in penning that the Burnham constitution allows for overseas-based Guyanese to vote in elections, I seriously doubt Guyanese would support it or that the government would undertake to restore overseas voting. The ruling party must have remembered how it was cheated out of office through the fraud of overseas voting and other forms of illegal balloting.
Guyanese remember the sordid abuses of overseas voting, postal voting, and proxy voting for the elections from 1968 to 1985. I remember watching documentaries at City College and on American TV, including two made by Granada TV in Britain, showing that animals voted. One of the reasons people gave to me in Guyana in numerous polls I conducted since 1992 for not wanting to vote for the opposition is the voting abuses in previous elections. I also have vivid memories as a youngster growing up in Port Mourant for the 1968 and 1973 elections in which an agent of the then ruling party went around the village marking off the names on an electoral list of those who migrated. We all know who voted for those and how they voted. People despised the overseas vote.
Some countries allow their overseas nationals to vote, and in fact provide facilities abroad for them to cast their ballots. Polling stations are set up by the consulates of several countries in NY for their nationals to vote and many do indeed take advantage of the overseas ballot. In fact, just last week, Iraqi Americans voted in several locations in America for their nation’s parliamentary elections with the support of the American government. The ballots are now being counted and fraud is extremely unlikely.
Although democracy has now been fully restored in Guyana and one may not have to worry about electoral abuses as in the past, I don’t think Guyanese want to take any chances that would restore the ballot to horses, donkeys, mules, cows, chicken, etc. They would like to see clean elections and as such they are likely to oppose overseas voting.
Yours faithfully,
Vishnu Bisram
