Georgetown, Guyana – August 29, 2025 – For Elections Commissioner Vincent Alexander, the problem facing Guyana’s electoral system is not a lack of advice but the refusal to act on it. As the nation prepares to vote on September 1, he is warning that the credibility of the process is again under threat because long-standing reform recommendations have gone unheeded.
Speaking in an interview with Editor-In-Chief of the Guyana Standard, Abena Rockliffe, Alexander pointed to a series of weaknesses that remain unresolved: bloated voter lists containing the names of deceased persons, cases where records show individuals overseas were still listed as having voted, and the absence of mechanisms to highlight such anomalies for scrutiny.
“The system is compromised,” Alexander said, insisting that GECOM has “committed the sin” of moving forward without addressing these concerns.This is not the first time these alarms have been raised. International observer missions, including the Organization of American States (OAS) and The Carter Center, have for years recommended safeguards such as biometric verification and stronger voter identification measures.
Both organizations criticized GECOM after the 2020 elections for failing to adopt such reforms, and just this month the OAS warned that the “very construct of the Commission” continues to block broad acceptance of results.
Yet despite repeated reminders, Alexander said little has changed. Issues as basic as the clarity of polling station layouts and the specific responsibilities of presiding officers remain unsettled. “We are entering an election without the essential reforms that would secure credibility. That leaves the results open to question,” he cautioned.
Observers note that Alexander’s position dovetails with the international record: the same vulnerabilities cited in 2015 and 2020 are resurfacing in 2025, with little evidence of structural progress. What is new, however, is the heightened public scrutiny of GECOM’s ability to deliver a credible process in one of Guyana’s most competitive elections in decades.
For Alexander, the lesson is simple, without reforms, each new election risks repeating the same cycle of distrust. “It is not that solutions don’t exist,” he argued. “It is that they are not being used.”
