Notice of date
for submission
of lists.
[16 of 1968
Reg. 6/1973]

9. The Commission shall, by notice published in the Gazette, appoint the day, being a day not later than the 32nd day before election day, on which lists of candidates may be submitted to the Chief Election Officer; and there shall be included in the notice particulars of the hours between which and the place at which the Chief Election Officer will attend to receive the lists.

Chief Election
Officer to receive
lists.

10. The Chief Election Officer shall attend in accordance with the notice given under section 9 to receive the lists of candidates; and no list shall be received at any other time or place.

Requirements of
lists.
[16 of 1968
Reg. 32/1964
Reg. 6/1973
O. 50/1980
O. 68/1980
22 of 1997
15 of 2000
12 of 2006]

11. (1) A list of candidates comprising registered voters who are eligible to be members of the National Assembly may be submitted by not less than three hundred and not more than three hundred and thirty persons for national top-up lists, and for each geographical constituency not less than one hundred and fifty and not more than one hundred and seventy-five persons whose names appear at the time of submission on the preliminary list mentioned in section 2(3), whether or not that list has at that date been modified as required by that section and shall be handed together with one copy thereof to the Chief Election Officer by the representative or the deputy representative of the list or by two of the persons named as candidates on the list at the time and place appointed; and the Chief Election Officer shall forthwith cause the copy of the list to be posted in a conspicuous place outside his office.

Form 2

11. (2) A list of candidates shall be in Form 2; and the submission shall bear the signature of each person submitting the same together with his name and the serial number of his registration record:

Provided that if any such person is unable to sign his name, his mark, made against his name written by some other person, shall be deemed to be his signature for the purposes of this paragraph but not for the purposes of section 12.

11. (3) A list of candidates shall set out the names, one below the other in such order as each party may determine of the surnames and other names, of at least 42 persons qualified to be elected to the National Assembly and who have consented to the inclusion of their names in the list as candidates for election, together with the address and occupation of each such person.

Form 3

11. (4) Each list of candidates shall be accompanied by a statutory declaration, in Form 3, by each person named therein as a candidate of his qualifications and consent, made before a justice of the peace, commissioner of oaths, notary public or other person authorised by law to administer an oath in the place where the declaration is made.

11. (5) Each list of candidates shall bear a title selected by the persons by whom it is submitted.

11. (6) Subject to section 11B, no person shall be a candidate on more than one list of candidates and no person shall be a signatory to more than one list.

11. (7) For the avoidance of doubt it is declared that a person may be a signatory to a list of candidates notwithstanding that he is named therein as a candidate.

11. (8) Stamp duty shall not be chargeable on any declaration made for the purposes of this section.

11. (9) In the event of the name of the person designated by any list of candidates as a Presidential candidate being deleted pursuant to section 21 from the list—

11. (9)(a) the representative of the list; or

11. (9)(b) if there is no representative or if the representative is unwilling or unable (by reason of absence, illness or any other cause) to act, the deputy representative of the list; or

11. (9)(c) in the case of any such unwillingness or inability on the part of the deputy representative or if there is no deputy representative, a majority of persons named as candidates in the list may designate in writing any such person able and willing to act, who shall forthwith and before election day, by written notice signed by him and delivered to the Commission, amend the list by designating any person whose name remains as a candidate on the list as the Presidential candidate designated by that list.

11. (10) On receipt of any notice of amendment pursuant to subsection (9), the Commission shall forthwith and before elections day give public notice of the amendment in such manner as it may in all the circumstances deem the most practicable and with effect from the time when such notice is given the new Presidential candidate specified in the notice shall be the Presidential candidate designated by that list.

Requirements for
geographical
constituencies.
[15 of 2000
2 of 2001]

11A. (1) The National Assembly shall contain at least sixty-five elected members, and their election shall be on a party lists basis to which the system of proportional representation shall be applied; in this section and in section 11C the system of proportional representation referred to is known as the largest remainder system using the “Hare quota”.

11A. (2) Guyana shall be divided in ten geographical constituencies for the purpose of electing members of the National Assembly from each geographical constituency.

11A. (3) Each of the ten regions of Guyana constituted as a registration district and a polling district under the Local Democratic Organs (Regional
Democratic Councils) Order 1980 shall be deemed to be a geographical constituency.

11A. (4) The ten geographical constituencies shall elect twenty-five of the members of the National Assembly. The number of members to be elected from each geographical constituency mentioned in the first column of the Table below shall be as shown in the corresponding entry in the second column of the Table.

Geographical Constituencies	Number of members of the National Assembly elected
No. 1 No. 2 No. 3 No. 4 No. 5 No. 6 No. 7 No. 8 No. 9 No. 10	2 2 3 7 2 3 2 1 1 2

11A. (5) The remaining elected members of the National Assembly shall be chosen from lists supplied by contesting parties and such list shall be designated “national top-up lists”.

Characteristics
that party lists
must satisfy.
[15 of 2000]

11B.(1) Each party shall contest in a minimum of six of the ten geographical constituencies, and shall also satisfy the criterion that a contesting party is contesting at least thirteen of the twenty-five seats specified in section 11A (4) in respect of the geographical constituencies.

11B.(2) Each party shall submit, for each geographical constituency in which it is contesting the general election, a list of names of persons qualified to be elected to the National Assembly; and each such list shall comprise two more names than the number of members of the National Assembly specified in section 11A (4) for the specific geographical constituency for which the list is submitted.

11B.(3) Each party shall submit a national top-up list, separate and distinct from lists relating to geographical constituencies, comprising at least forty-two names of persons qualified to be elected to the National Assembly, and the party’s Presidential Candidate shall be so identified on, and only on, its national top-up list.

11B.(4) Each party may duplicate names on its geographical constituency lists and its national top-up list, subject to the following provisions –

11B.(4)(a) a candidate’s name can appear on only one geographical constituency list;

11B.(4)(b) a candidate’s name can appear on only one party’s lists;

11B.(4)(c) a candidate’s name can appear on a geographical constituency list and also on the national top-up list of a party, but if the candidate is allocated a seat based on the results in a geographical constituency that candidate’s name cannot also be extracted from the national top-up list, and vice versa, for membership of the National Assembly.

11B.(5) The total number of females on each party’s national top-up list shall be at least one-third of the total number of persons on that list.

11B.(6) The total number of females on any party’s lists for geographical constituencies, taken together, shall be at least one-third of the total number of persons on those lists taken together for the geographical constituencies in which that party is contesting.

11B.(7) There shall be no more than twenty per cent of the number of geographical constituencies in which a party is contesting for which the party’s geographical constituency list contains no female.

11B.(8) In the extraction from the lists and declaration of names of the candidates who have been elected account shall be taken –

11B.(8)(i) of the total number of females on each party’s national top-up lists and the lists for geographical constituencies, taken together, being at least one-third of the number of persons on those lists as mentioned in paragraphs (5), (6) and (7); and

11B.(8)(ii) of the proportion that women formed of the electorate.

11B.(9) The order in which a party states the names of candidates on its lists shall be as the party deems fit.

Voting and
allocation of seats
in the National
Assembly.
[15 of 2000
2 of 2001]

11C. (1) Every elector shall have only one vote which shall be cast in the geographical constituency in which he is registered and votes in respect of the list of his choice, and that vote shall be counted to determine the outcomes of both the election for that geographical constituency and for the country taken as a whole: a vote for a Party’s geographical constituency list is simultaneously a vote for that Party’s national top-up list.

11C. (2) Within each geographical constituency, the seats allocated to a party for membership of the National Assembly from the geographical constituency shall be determined by application of the system of proportional representation to the valid votes cast in that geographical constituency in relation to the total number of seats being contested in that geographical constituency, thereby allocating to parties the twenty-five seats under section 11A (4).

11C. (3) Subject to the proviso to subsection (5) for the country taken as a whole, the total seats allocated to a party for membership of the National Assembly shall be determined by application of the system of proportional representation to the valid votes for parties countrywide in
relation to the sixty-five elected seats of the National Assembly.

11C. (4) For each geographical constituency, each party shall extract from its geographical constituency list the candidates to become members of the National Assembly on the basis of the seats allocated under subsection (2)

11C. (5) The number of seats in the National Assembly that is additional to the number of seats allocated to a party from the geographical constituencies as determined under subsection (2) shall be determined by
subtracting the number determined under subsection (2) from the total number of seats that is to be allocated to the party under subsection (3):

Provided that in the event that the arithmetical calculations of total seats allocated to a party for membership of the National Assembly in accordance with subsection (3) produce the result that a party is allocated
a fewer number of seats than those it has already obtained on the basis of the calculations that are in accordance with subsection (2), the allocations based on the distribution of sixty-five seats shall be made; the number of geographical constituency seats already allocated to parties shall not be changed, thereby maintaining the total number of geographical constituency seats at twenty-five; the total number of elected members of the National assembly shall be increased to accommodate the allocations of the number of nongeographical members and no further calculation based on the increased size of the Assembly shall be done.

11C. (6) Each party shall extract from its national topup list candidates who together comprise the additional number of seats allocated to the party under subsection (4), provided that the provisions in section 11B (4) (c) are observed.