Dear Editor,
Further to a Joint Statement by the United States of America, United Kingdom, Canada and the European Union on Guyana’s failure to deliver a credible General and Regional Elections result and the country’s probable isolation, there are a variety of sanctions we can anticipate.
Here is a summary of possible economic impacts on the country:
Sanctions can come in the form of travel restrictions and asset freezes on persons in power, especially constitutional office holders, police, army officials, politicians and other citizens guilty of criminal behaviour and the violation of human rights such as electoral fraud etc.
In Guyana’s case, the Region Four tabulation, verification and declaration process was ruled illegal by the Chief Justice on 11 March, 2020. The second declaration was also widely rejected as it did not follow the rules set out in law and the CJ’s ruling.
All of the International Observers and Political Parties, except the governing party, pronounced that the process lacked transparency and was not credible.
If American sanctions target persons first, which is usually the case, the sanction is designed to effect a change in behaviour in the persons concerned to do the right thing and exercise the legal options available to them.
If the Coalition and GECOM fail to deliver a legitimate elections result, then personal sanctions are likely to follow. In the event that a swearing in occurs of an illegal President using the fraudulent declaration of Region Four, and a government is undemocratically installed against the will of the people, the following is likely to occur:
Sanctions will be placed on the President and his entire Cabinet, their families, and in some cases close associates.
Sanctions on members of the staff of the Guyana Elections Commission
who were fraudulently involved in elections rigging and malpractice.
All political appointees and their families
Members of the Guyana Police Force directly involved and complicit in enforcing the installation of an illegal government.
Members of the Army similarly involved in enforcing the installation of an illegal government.
Members of the Judiciary if illegal power is facilitated using the judiciary
as a means.
All other politically affiliated persons contributing to or enabling the establishment of an illegal government.
While personal sanctions are imposed, Guyana under an illegal government, will become a pariah state, subject as a country to, but not limited to, expulsion from the international and regional community.
Such exclusion would lock out Guyana from accessing finance from international funding agencies such as the World Bank, IMF, CDB and IDB and other international banks. Needless to say that this would drastically retard development and severely damage, with all of its social ramifications, the way of life of the Guyanese people.
Sanctions will further manifest themselves by global banks being issued instructions from the US Treasury Department’s enforcement arm, the Office of Foreign Asset Control (OFAC) to bar financial transactions from being routed through the USA.
Other countries, such as Canada, UK and the EU member states will put similar arrangements in place to bar wire transfers of funds from being routed through their registered banks and jurisdiction (s) which they control.
The isolation of Guyana will result in a suffocation of businesses. Payments for imports will not be able to be completed, thereby, starving Guyana of essential materials for plant and machinery, branded goods, parts for manufacturers and retailers, trucks, cars, clothing and all other forms of imported goods we use and consume as citizens.
The trading of Guyana’s gold on the world market can be frozen.
Faced with these sanctions and international isolation, Guyana will be forced to use up the little reserves we have at the Central Bank, which is approximately 2.5 months of import cover based on the reserve level at the Bank of Guyana. Thereafter Guyana will find itself bereft of the kind of resources levels to sustain the needs of businesses and their operations.
When this kind of shortage of goods and currency is imposed on an economy, it results in unmanageable inflation escalating further and deeper into hyperinflation driving the poor to the brink of mass starvation.
The chain reaction then pushes mass migration out of Guyana, thereby weakening local demand and resulting in the ultimate destruction of the entire fabric of the Guyanese society.
There is no future scenario to contemplate where a positive can come about from undemocratic rule.
Yours faithfully,
Deodat Indar
Financial Expert
Former President -Georgetown Chamber of Commerce and Industry Former Vice Chairman -Private Sector Commission of Guyana
