General election: Is the immigrant vote important?
Monday, 11 August 2014 -Written by Denis Scott Chabrol – Demerara Waves
There were conflicting views about whether votes by naturalized Guyanese and Commonwealth citizens can determine the outcome of the next general election that is expected within another five months.
The People’s Progressive Party (PPP) brushed off suggestions that the immigrant-vote would be a decider in the polls while the Alliance For Change (AFC) felt strongly that it could influence the outcome. Now that the AFC has presented a no-confidence motion to the National Assembly, elections could be called between now and January 31, 2014.
The ruling party’s General Secretary, Clement Rohee believed that the immigrant vote would account fir less than 0.1 percent. “That’s my empirical view…Most of those people don’t worry to participate in our processes much less elections,” he said.
He said the PPP-Civic would seek to capitalize on the immigrant vote but argued that born Guyanese would continue to be the main target group. “The bulk of the voters in this country are Guyanese…and those are the people we have to target. They are the ones that really matter, not to say that a naturalised person does not matter but we are not carving out any electoral strategic niche simply because they were granted naturalisation status. They were entitled to it by law. They don’t owe us anything,” said Rohee whose Home Affairs Ministry is responsible for the processing of citizenship.
He disagreed that the foreign-born voters would be “beholden” to the PPP because the incumbent party has facilitated them. “I think that is underestimating the intelligence of these people. These people are intelligent enough to make such decisions on their own,” he said.
Rohee said it was too early to state whether the PPPC would be having a multi-lingual campaign to cater for the Chinese, Indians and Brazilians. He, however, hinted that they would be targeted in the manifesto and other campaign material with the aim of convincing them that “this is the country to live in.”
Political Scientist, Freddie Kissoon’s position is that votes by naturalized Guyanese would not sway the election in favour of the incumbent party if A Partnership for National Unity (APNU)/Peoples National Congress Reform (PNCR) make special efforts to get their traditional support base to turn out at the polls. “It will not be sufficient to determine the outcome for the simple fact that one hundred and thirty thousand registered voters did not vote in the last election,” he said.
Kissoon, now a newspaper columnist, however, noted that a “substantial” number of traditional APNU/PNCR supporters between 18 and 30 years are comparatively nomadic between the interior and various parts of the coast at any given time.
AFC General Secretary, David Patterson said that with the declining population, the influx of Chinese, Brazilians and Indians would play a role in the country’s elections. Noting that on average a parliamentary seat is 5,000 seats, he said that number of votes could easily influence a top-up seat.
Patterson believed that the immigrant vote would give the ruling People’s Progressive Party Civic (PPPC) an advantage at a time when that political organisation would be looking to regain its parliamentary majority. “Obviously, it will be the incumbent because they are the persons granting the permits,” he told Demerara Waves Online News.
The AFC official cautioned that his party would not be lending support to special-interest projects if they would be used inducements for foreign workers to cast ballots in the general and regional elections.
Also read:
PPP hints at general election before no-confidence vote http://bit.ly/1kWVKiD
Comments
One must look to USA s elections to ‘speculate’ on the outcome of Guyana s election/results.. USA plays a very important if not influential role in the region. It was the Hispanics vote that gave Obama another term….the
swing vote. However I do feel that the PPPC must be
favourites at present but the swing vote can change
that….last minute deciders/voters. The president would be
acting wisely to call elections before vote of no confidence
‘Taking bull by its horns’…..
Lets see what happens before we speculate on outcome.
My spin
Kamtan
Calling local elections before the national elections will favour
PPPC …. tactically correct as it shows ‘decisiveness’ on the
part of the president. Also after results are known it can
indicate how the electorate are thinking….canvassing for
votes more obvious. Again one step at a time…poco poco
Little by little !
Kamtan
The Hispanic vote did not give Obama the election. Hispanics make up 16% of the US population but only 8.4% are eligible to vote. Fewer Hispanics turned out to vote in 2012 than 2008 and not all voted for him. Obama won because many conservatives stayed away from the polls. And fewer democrats turned out to vote. The US 2012 election had one of the lowest participation rates.
Our household voted for Obama in 2008. My son (age 23 at the time) even volunteered on his ‘get out the vote’ campaign and faced his share of angry anti-Obama folks which convinced my husband – a registered independent who normally leans republican – to vote for Obama. No one in our household voted for Obama in 2012. I voted for Ron Paul knowing fully well my vote wouldn’t count since he was not on the ballot. My oldest daughter recently turned 18 and the first thing she did was registered to vote. She plans on voting in this year’s mid terms. Guyanese who are eligible to vote should not be denied this right because of power hungry racist people!
I remembered when the US govt issued ominous threats against the Iraqi people to get them to go out and vote. Apparently, the Iraqi people were refusing to participate in this US sham democracy operation (and history is repeating itself in Iraq as I type). Beware of US style dictatorship… er … democracy – and those parties aligned with it.