Minister of Foreign Affairs Dr Karen Cummings yesterday said that calls by the international community that the David Granger-led APNU+AFC administration abide by the country’s Constitution as it pertains to calling elections were unnecessary.
“Everybody is free to [have their own views], that is their right, I guess. But you know, we strive to ensure that we don’t interfere in other person’s territory. We maintain our territorial integrity and our sovereignty and even the CARICOM’s position is non-interference, non-intervention,” she told a press conference at Takuba Lodge yesterday.
“Of course you can make recommendations. At the Cabinet level, at our caucus level, we have decided that we will obey the rule of law and we will continue until the next president is sworn in,” she added.
The Foreign Affairs Minister said that she in no way believes that President Granger’s swift issuance of the elections date proclamation after calls from the Organisation of American States (OAS) and other organisations, came from fear of sanctions because his government is always committed to adherence to the law.
“I spoke to the Secretary-General [of the United Nations] and so on and he was happy to say that in Guyana there is no war. I mean, we have a little problem here and there…but there are no lives being lost and so on. I don’t think we need sanctions at this time because we are very peaceful citizens. We are going along our peaceful way; who is going to market or going to work. Thank God, we have maintained the peace,” she said.
“I do agree that there was a misunderstanding with the Commonwealth and we were able to clear up some of this with [Commonwealth Secre-tary-General Baroness Patricia Scotland]. It was what happens you know, people like to take first jump. Our opposition leader would have been sending out signals, proffering different statements and so on. So what [they] have heard of first [they] may want to react to. But when you look at Guyana, we are going ahead with our business agenda. It is business as usual, so to speak. We know a date has been fixed, we know elections are due. We will abide by that. The president has said that several times and that is what we are doing,” she added.
One day after the OAS said that it was looking forward to a proclamation of March 2nd, 2020 as the date for the now overdue general elections here, and urged an end to the political uncertainty that has gripped Guyana, Granger announced that the proclamation was made.
The OAS General Secretariat underlined the importance to the people of Guyana of leaving behind the period of political uncertainty as soon as possible.
“The General Secretar-iat will continue to follow the situation in Guyana and remains available to provide support as the authorities may require in ensuring the next elections meet the standards of transparency, credibility and integrity, required of all democracies,” the hemispheric body said in a statement.
Previously, the United States, the United King-dom, the European Union and the Commonwealth had chided the Guyana government for functioning unconstitutionally.
The Caribbean Community has remained silent on the situation.
Yesterday, Cummings said that her government allowed for the judicial process to take place and will abide by the rulings of the courts but the country has to have a system in place to be functional.
“It is an open secret that after the [no-confidence motion] on December 21st, that the judicial system remains unimpaired, we respect the rule of law. You would recall our executive president would have said that he is going to dissolve parliament and that he would remain president until another president is sworn in. We don’t want to be like a headless chicken, everybody comes out…public servants need to be paid and so on. We have been reiterating that we are aware of the situation, we don’t want to aggravate the situation,” she said.
“Our right was to take it to [the] different tiers of the judicial system – Supreme Court, Appeal Court, CCJ – we all know that history now. We respect the rule of law although there [are] various interpretations of the law. But we recognise, and I don’t want to use the word interim status, but the president has agreed to that. He has announced a date and whatever he says, you can hold him accountable, that the date of elections will be March 2nd 2020 and this after having word from [Chairperson of the Guyana Elections Commission retired Justice Claudette Singh], who said that having a credible election will be possible after February month end. What we are saying is that GECOM is autonomous and they are the ones to say, ‘President, we are going to be ready for credible elections, which everybody will be happy with…’”, she added.
