Prime Minister Anthony's visit
Editorial
It has been announced that the Prime Minister of St. Lucia, Dr Kenny Anthony, will be visiting Guyana this week for talks with President Bharrat Jagdeo and the leaders of other political parties. Dr Anthony was assigned the responsibility by the Caricom heads of government for monitoring the political situation here. The Prime Minister will be aware that dialogue has been restarted. That is a positive step but it remains to be seen how effective it will be. What everyone is hoping for is that some form of dialogue can also be established at the highest level between Mr Jagdeo and Mr Hoyte. Mr Jagdeo has already indicated his intention to invite Mr Hoyte for a meeting. Mr Hoyte has kept the door open to this, saying he will respond when he gets the letter. Perhaps Dr. Anthony can use his good offices to seek to facilitate such a meeting. It is in principle extremely undesirable to have a situation in which the president and the leader of the opposition are not on speaking terms and anything that can be done to break that impasse will be welcome. Dr Anthony will also have been briefed that an eleven member Special Select Committee has been chosen by the Committee of Selection of the National Assembly to consider the recommendations contained in the report of the Constitution Reform Commission. The committee has been authorised to select its advisers and the political parties represented are also entitled to have their own advisers who can participate in discussions but not vote. The committee has been mandated to complete its consideration of the report and to recommend proposals for a reformed constitution by October 3l, an extremely tight and optimistic deadline given the fact that many of the commission's recommendations (for example on a second chamber, citizenship, the powers of the presidency) require detailed further consideration. In other words, there has been definite progress in the two main areas outlined in the Herdmanston agreement, though they are both well behind schedule as a great deal of time was wasted in setting them up. The next step will be the drafting of the new constitution which will have to be passed by the National Assembly. Some of the clauses will require approval at a referendum, to be administered by a new Elections Commission. A decision on the composition of this commission will be a priority of the select committee so the commission can be set up at the earliest opportunity and start its preparations for voter registration and the referendum and the elections. And then the elections have to be held, probably in January 200l. As we have said before it is vital that these elections be run as efficiently and transparently as possible so that the losers have no plausible grounds for complaint. This is an area in which Caricom may wish to seek to provide some practical assistance, perhaps in the shape of a full time consultant or adviser chosen from the ranks of experienced senior electoral officials in the region. Dr Anthony may have some ideas on this. Whether that will then all add up to the goal the three wise men, all of Caricom and the vast majority of Guyanese seek, namely the return of political peace and stability to Guyana only time can tell. 
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