Elections anxiety

With thousands of Guyanese casting their votes earlier this week, our nation has spent several days waiting with bated breath for the results to be announced. GECOM, remaining true to form was unable to deliver results as quickly as the populace would have liked. While annoyance towards the slow updates provided is understandable, patience was the word of the week as hasty counts could result in an even longer recounts – as have already been happening in several areas. A recount at this point would further increase the population’s anxiety and can quickly see the situation devolving further. Given the fanfare surrounding this election, many are of course on their toes over which way the pendulum of power will swing and what that would mean for the direction of our country.

Many are in a state of anxiousness as they await results for the mother of all elections. This anxiety can be noted in our relatively clear streets and almost empty schools across the country. The business community particularly seems to be in a heightened state of anxiety, with the private sector and their respective bodies calling for a release of the results. Many businesses have closed shop since the day before elections. Gas stations remained closed off and retail businesses remain boarded up and shuttered. There were even recommendations and warnings released by many in the business sector on preparation for the election results. I wonder about the business community’s high expectation of violence from “you know who” against them. What are they trying to say and to what end?

So far, the process has been plagued with several disturbances that saw allegations of vote tampering being levelled against the two large parties. Region 4 has experienced the most setbacks with regards to counting all the votes as discrepancies, disturbances, tiredness and a bomb threat have frequently halted the process. Given the tight race between the two major parties, pushing this narrative of voter suppression and tampering will aid in riling up the supporters of whichever party inevitably loses. The discord seen so far and that which is to come in my opinion is all part and parcel of the divisive agendas our nation’s leaders. Ultimately, it is the ruling class that benefits from the discord while their ethnic foot soldiers in battle suffer the brunt of the effects. Our political leaders are first beholden to the corporate interests that fund them while the people who go out in their numbers to elect them are used and then abandoned.

With a history steeped in colonial conquest and rule divisions amongst the two largest racial groups, our society from the beginning has been falling into the trap of separatism. This would be exacerbated by our ethnic division post emancipation and since then, politicians have found a trusty and reliable friend in race voting. While for the cameras, politicians are quick to condemn and rail against racist ideas and policies, in their bottom house meetings, community strongholds and the privacy of party planning meetings, this racism is used as a strategic weapon in which to anger, enflame and drive discord and competition. Many from both sides of the political divide fall victim to this dog whistle politics and repeat it as gospel.

While it can often become tempting to denigrate and disregard those who vote based on race, it must also be understood that many see it as being necessary to protect their interests as a racial/ethnic group. Given our checkered history in which race-based political rule affected and set the Indo and Afro population against each other and severely impacted access to opportunities, our allegiances to racial voting has strengthened over the years.

In appealing to long established ethnic insecurities between the two major ethnic groups, our politicians are able to manipulate our fears of being disenfranchised by the other side. This heightens feelings of mistrust amongst us and the veil of multi-ethnic unity falls away. There is the frequently touted belief that all a we is one family, who only fall out when its election season. Due to this belief, when ethnic and racial angsts are at their highest during this period, there is usually an urging to return to our default state of tolerance and acceptance. However, the fact that this tolerance and acceptance is for the most part surface level makes reining in this angst even more difficult.

While many hope for a post racial future in which we can live equitably with each other, our voting patterns continue to belie this dream of a country free from the racial wounds we continue to inflict on ourselves.