Historyedit

Before colonisationedit

What is now Guyana has been inhabited for millennia. Nine indigenous tribes reside in Guyana: the Wai Wai, Macushi, Patamona, Lokono, Kalina, Wapishana, Pemon, Akawaio, and Warao. Many of these peoples practised shifting agriculture alongside hunting. Historians speculate that the Arawaks and Caribs originated in the South American hinterland and migrated northward, first to the present-day Guianas and then to the Caribbean islands. The Arawak, mainly cultivators, hunters, and fishermen, migrated to the Caribbean islands before the Carib and settled throughout the region.

Colonial periodedit

Although Christopher Columbus was the first European to sight Guyana during his third voyage (in 1498), and Sir Walter Raleigh wrote an account in 1596, the Dutch were the first Europeans to establish colonies: Pomeroon (1581), Essequibo (1616), Berbice (1627), and Demerara (1752). After France invaded the Dutch Republic (1795), the British assumed control in 1796, with the Dutch and British signing the London Convention in 1814 that ceded Demerara-Essequibo and Berbice to Britain.

In 1831, the united colonies of Demerara-Essequibo and separate colony of Berbice together became a single British colony known as British Guiana.

Since its independence in 1824, Venezuela has claimed the area of land to the west of the Essequibo River. Simón Bolívar wrote to the British government warning against the Berbice and Demerara settlers settling on land which the Venezuelans, as assumed heirs of Spanish claims on the area dating to the 16th century, claimed was theirs. In 1899, an international tribunal ruled that the land belonged to Great Britain. From the Anglo-Dutch Treaty of 1814, the British inherited Dutch territory which included lands between the Orinoco and Courantyne rivers. Dutch sovereignty over these settlements was recognised in 1648 by Spain with the Peace of Münster, which stated under Article 5 that the Dutch would retain all of the ‘lordships, cities, castles, fortresses, trades and lands in the… West Indies’ under their possession at the time. However, the treaty did not specify the boundary between Spanish Guiana and Dutch Guiana.

Independenceedit

Guyana achieved independence from the United Kingdom as a dominion on 26 May 1966 and became a republic on 23 February 1970, remaining a member of the Commonwealth. Shortly after independence, Venezuela began to take diplomatic, economic, and military action against Guyana to enforce its territorial claim to the Essequibo region.

Following independence, Forbes Burnham of the People's National Congress Reform rose to power, quickly becoming a repressive authoritarian leader. Politics became divided on race with the Afro-Guyanese supporting Burnham's People's National Congress and the Indo-Guyanese supporting Jagan's People's Progressive Party, in what became known as aapan jaat politics, loosely translated from Guyanese Hindustani as "vote for your own kind".

Guyana was elected three times as a member of the UN Security Council in 1975–76, 1982–83 and 2024–25.

In 1978, a total of 918 people died at the Jonestown mass murder-suicide led by cult leader Jim Jones at a remote settlement in northwest Guyana.

Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter visited Guyana to lobby for the resumption of free elections. On 5 October 1992, a new National Assembly and regional councils were elected in the first Guyanese election since 1964 to be internationally recognised as free and fair. Cheddi Jagan of the PPP was elected and sworn in as president on 9 October 1992. This reversed the monopoly that Afro-Guyanese traditionally had over Guyanese politics. The poll was marred by violence however.

In May 2008, President Bharrat Jagdeo was a signatory to the UNASUR Constitutive Treaty of the Union of South American Nations. The Guyanese government officially ratified the treaty in 2010.

In March 2020, President David A. Granger narrowly lost the snap elections, following Granger's government loss of a vote of no confidence back in 2018. Granger refused to accept the results, but eventually five months later, Irfaan Ali of the People's Progressive Party/Civic was sworn in as the new president because of allegations of fraud and irregularities.

The National Trust of Guyana has designated nine historic sites as national monuments.

A referendum in neighbouring Venezuela was held in December 2023 on the annexation of the disputed Essequibo region, which lies entirely in the territory of Guyana. The vote passed with a 95% majority, but with a low turnout, with analysts stating Maduro's government had falsified the results. This came at the same time as a Venezuelan military buildup on the Guyanese border, sparking concerns of war between the two states.