In July of 2018, key members of civil society as well as several concerned citizens expressed concern about the inclusion of a sedition clause – by both government and opposition – in Guyana’s new Cyber Crime Bill. While the pushback was successful, another contentious clause remained, despite opposition by the Guyana Press Association, the provision on criminal defamation.

One year later, after highlighting allegations of serious patient-care abuses at a private medical institution on social media, activist Melissa “Melly Mel” Atwell was arrested and initially charged for criminal defamation against the institution under section 19(3) of the Cyber Crime Act. Atwell was held for 12 hours, had her phone and computer taken, and finally placed on $180,000 bail. While the case is still waiting to be heard, and while the hospital has also filed a multimillion-dollar civil libel suit against Ms. Atwell, her travel has been monitored and managed by the Guyana Police Force, with her being recently detained on reentry into the country.

It is notable that both APNU+AFC and the PPP supported the inclusion of criminal libel in the Cyber Crime Act. In 2013, an International Press Institute (IPI) team visited Guyana specifically to fact-find on political will towards repealing criminal libel. The general findings of the mission were that the political leadership, with the exception of the AFC’s Khemraj Ramjattan, were not keen on repealing criminal libel with APNU’s David Granger, then leader of the opposition and Samuel Hinds, then Prime Minister casting doubt on repealing criminal libel, seeing it as a means of controlling what they deemed to be irresponsible journalism.

Five years later, both PPP and the APNU+AFC coalition, including Ramjattan as Minister of Public Security, cooperated in not only retaining criminal libel in Guyana’s law book but further extending it into the realm of cyberspace. We do not believe that criminal libel has any place in a modern liberal democracy, whether on or off the Internet. It only serves as a tool of last (or at times first) resort for governments prone to autocratic action and powerful private sector interests intent on suppressing criticism.

As the International Press Institute noted in its Guyana report, “IPI, for its part, believes that so long as they remain on the books criminal libel laws are prone to abuse by prominent figures who seek to squelch critical coverage in order to silence investigations into their wrongdoings and other activities, and therewith protect their economic or political interests, maintain power, and possibly avoid criminal liability. IPI considers laws that punish ‘insult’ or speech viewed as ‘contemptuous of authority’ to be undemocratic and incompatible with notions of free speech.”

Today Melissa Atwell is a member of the Citizenship Initiative, a candidate for general elections, and will be taking the lead once elected to Parliament in our repeal of criminal defamation from the laws of Guyana.