Corentyne C
The Central Corentyne Chamber of Commerce last week called for a Commission of Inquiry (CoI) to be conducted into the 2020 general and regional elections.
Chamber President Mohammed Raffik told a news conference that the last five months have been an extremely difficult time for Guyana and stressed that it is important that the aftermath of the election does not repeat itself ever again in Guyana. “We are going to be urging the government that as soon as they have settled down we need to have a Commission of Inquiry into exactly what took place at GECOM [Guyana Elections Commission], from the first, beginning with the declaration of [Region Four, Returning Officer, Clairmont] Mingo,” he said last Wednesday. “We would like to have a complete CoI into what took place, who were the authors and exactly how this whole thing went down,” he added.
Raffik, who said the Chamber was proud to have been a part of observing the elections and recount process, stressed that the past five months somewhat paralysed Guyana and setback social cohesion. “It took race relations in Guyana back down many years. We now have to try to rebuild that. We don’t need that,” he argued.
During his inauguration address last Saturday, new president Irfaan Ali announced that a planned review of the recentlyconcluded elections process and to hold anyone who tried to undermine it to account.
“A review of events related to the electoral process over the last five months will begin shortly in order to determine, forensically, exactly what transpired, and to hold accountable any persons who sought to pervert and corrupt the system,” Ali