Investing in Guyana Buys No Residence and No Passport
Answer
The general rule applies to you
No exception is recorded for citizens of Suriname on this topic. That is the answer, not a gap - everything below is the rule you get, unchanged.
81 exceptions recorded across 33 countries · none match Suriname to Guyana · Residency through investment
Guyana has an Investment Act and no investor visa. The Act gives a foreign investor a long list of guarantees - the right to buy or lease land, to open accounts in Guyanese and foreign currency, to repatriate dividends and capital, to employ skilled foreign personnel - and then, on the question of staying in the country, says only that the Government shall facilitate entry "in accordance with the Immigration Act". That Act offers the same permit a tourist gets, marked for trade or business, capped at three years from the date of entry. There is no minimum investment, no threshold that converts into status, and no citizenship by investment: the only ways to become Guyanese are birth, descent, marriage, registration and naturalisation, and none of them mentions money. What an investor does get, which matters more than it sounds, is the Status of Aliens Act: an alien may hold and dispose of property in Guyana in the same manner in all respects as a Commonwealth citizen.
At a glance
- Minimum investment for residence
- None; there is no investment-based residence route
- Citizenship by investment
- None. The Constitution and the Citizenship Act between them provide birth, descent, marriage, registration and naturalisation, and nothing else
- Land ownership by a foreigner
- Permitted, on the same footing as a Commonwealth citizen
- Business visa period, as the Ministry of Foreign Affairs grants it
- Five yearsas of 2026-10-06
Longer than any permit section 12 of the Immigration Act can produce, which is capped at three years from entry.
- Business visa fee
- US$140.00, and a further US$140.00 for each five-year renewalas of 2026-10-06
- Repatriation of profits
- Dividends, earnings, capital and the proceeds of a sale may be remitted freely, subject to tax
Requirements
- There is no investor residence category to apply for
- In practice, a permit under section 12 of the Immigration Act marked for purposes of trade or business
- For the Ministry of Home Affairs business route: a sponsor in Guyana, the company's business registration, income tax and National Insurance receipts, police clearance, a medical report, and evidence of your business credentials from your home country
- Registration of the enterprise under the ordinary company and business-names law; the Investment Act creates no separate investor registration
In detail
What the Investment Act does and does not do
Guyana's Investment Act of 2004 is a guarantees statute. It promises non-intervention in management, free export and import, protection against expropriation other than on the terms of section 14, the right to lease or buy land, the right to hold foreign-currency accounts, the right to remit profits, and access to international arbitration. On immigration it stops at the door: sections 19, 20 and 21 all say the Government will facilitate something "in compliance with" or "in accordance with" the Immigration Act, and the Immigration Act has one permit with one three-year ceiling. An investor in Guyana has strong property and capital rights and a weak immigration position, which is an unusual combination.
No citizenship by investment, and how we know
Guyana is a CARICOM member and is not an OECS member, and it does not run a citizenship-by-investment programme. The proof is a closed list rather than an absence of advertising. Chapter IV of the Constitution sets out every way a person may be or become a citizen - continuation at independence, birth in Guyana, birth abroad to a Guyanese parent, marriage to a citizen, and whatever Parliament provides under article 48. What Parliament provided is the Guyana Citizenship Act: registration of a Commonwealth citizen or Irish citizen after five years, registration of minors, and naturalisation on the terms of the Second Schedule. The Second Schedule asks for twelve months' residence, five years in the preceding seven, good character and an intention to reside. No limb of any of those provisions mentions investment, a contribution, a fund or a purchase.
The property point is the real one
The Status of Aliens Act is three sections long and the operative one puts an alien on exactly the same footing as a Commonwealth citizen for taking, holding and disposing of movable and immovable property of every description. There is no licence to acquire land, no reciprocity test and no cap, which is not true everywhere in the Caribbean. The provisos exclude property outside Guyana, legislative franchise and public office, and preserve interests arising before 1891; none of them touches an ordinary purchase.
Country-level policy
Guyana's statute book is published under the Law Revision Act, which establishes a Law Revision Commission chaired by the Attorney-General, lets it publish in loose-leaf or any other form it determines, and makes every authorised page bear the number of the Law Revision Order that put it there. Section 9 then says those pages are, in all courts and for all purposes, the sole and proper Statute Book of Guyana for the law in force on the relevant revision date. The authority is therefore the L.R.O. number printed at the foot of every page, and on mola.gov.gy two different numbers are in circulation. The first three volumes carry L.R.O. 1/2022; everything from volume four onwards carries L.R.O. 1/2012, which the Attorney General told the National Assembly in June 2026 shows the law as it stood on 31 December 2012. Immigration, citizenship, aliens, the CARICOM Acts, income tax, customs and road traffic are all in the older half.
What applies to you
Nothing changes for a citizen of Suriname
We have no rule recorded that treats your citizenship differently here, so the general rule above is the one that applies to you. That is an answer, not a gap.
What the law says
«20. The Government shall facilitate the entry into,
c. 14:02. stay in, and departure from Guyana of investors, their
foreign personnel, and their immediate family members in
accordance with the Immigration Act, but such persons are
subject to and must comply with the laws of Guyana while
they are in Guyana.»A promise of facilitation, not a status. The marginal reference is to the Immigration Act, Cap. 14:02, which has no investor category.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
Guyana's law portal, publishing the Laws of Guyana chapter by chapter as PDFs. The Law Revision Act, Chapter 2:02, makes the Law Revision Commission - chaired by the Attorney General, with the Chief Parliamentary Counsel a member by office - responsible for preparing, publishing and maintaining the edition, lets it choose the form of publication, requires every page to carry the number of the Law Revision Order that authorised it, and provides by section 9 that those pages are in all courts and for all purposes the sole and proper Statute Book of Guyana for the law in force on the relevant revision date. The portal also carries draft bills and ministry news.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: It serves two editions at once and says so nowhere on its listing. On 2026-10-06, 52 of its 461 chapter entries carried L.R.O. 1/2022 - volumes 1 and 2 and part of volume 3 - and the remaining 409 carried L.R.O. 1/2012. The Attorney General told the National Assembly in June 2026 that 1/2012 shows the law as at 31 December 2012 and 1/2022 all laws enacted to 31 December 2022, so the L.R.O. number at the foot of each page is the only way to tell which edition you are reading. Everything that matters for migration - the Immigration Act, the Guyana Citizenship Act, the Aliens Act, all five CARICOM chapters, the Income Tax Act, the Customs Act, the Motor Vehicles and Road Traffic Act - is still in the 2012 half. It must never be cited for what the law is now: the Income Tax Act it publishes prints a flat 33 1/3 per cent and has no section 36A, while the Revenue Authority charges 25 and 35 per cent under a section 36A. It publishes no amending Acts and no statutory instruments at all, so there is nothing on the site to check a Chapter against. Several chapters omit their own subsidiary legislation or schedules and say so in a note. Filenames carry a volume label and a unix timestamp, so a chapter's URL cannot be guessed and changes when the file is replaced.
We re-read it every 60 days. More about this source
«15. Subject to the laws for the time being in force,
owning land. investors may purchase or lease land in Guyana and
dispose of or transfer their interests in or rights over the
land.»The words set off on their own lines inside this quotation are the section's marginal note and the amending-Act references, which the publisher prints down the left-hand edge of the page; the extraction places them inline.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
Guyana's law portal, publishing the Laws of Guyana chapter by chapter as PDFs. The Law Revision Act, Chapter 2:02, makes the Law Revision Commission - chaired by the Attorney General, with the Chief Parliamentary Counsel a member by office - responsible for preparing, publishing and maintaining the edition, lets it choose the form of publication, requires every page to carry the number of the Law Revision Order that authorised it, and provides by section 9 that those pages are in all courts and for all purposes the sole and proper Statute Book of Guyana for the law in force on the relevant revision date. The portal also carries draft bills and ministry news.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: It serves two editions at once and says so nowhere on its listing. On 2026-10-06, 52 of its 461 chapter entries carried L.R.O. 1/2022 - volumes 1 and 2 and part of volume 3 - and the remaining 409 carried L.R.O. 1/2012. The Attorney General told the National Assembly in June 2026 that 1/2012 shows the law as at 31 December 2012 and 1/2022 all laws enacted to 31 December 2022, so the L.R.O. number at the foot of each page is the only way to tell which edition you are reading. Everything that matters for migration - the Immigration Act, the Guyana Citizenship Act, the Aliens Act, all five CARICOM chapters, the Income Tax Act, the Customs Act, the Motor Vehicles and Road Traffic Act - is still in the 2012 half. It must never be cited for what the law is now: the Income Tax Act it publishes prints a flat 33 1/3 per cent and has no section 36A, while the Revenue Authority charges 25 and 35 per cent under a section 36A. It publishes no amending Acts and no statutory instruments at all, so there is nothing on the site to check a Chapter against. Several chapters omit their own subsidiary legislation or schedules and say so in a note. Filenames carry a volume label and a unix timestamp, so a chapter's URL cannot be guessed and changes when the file is replaced.
We re-read it every 60 days. More about this source
«description may be taken, acquired, held and disposed of»The sentence reads: "Movable and immovable property of every description may be taken, acquired, held and disposed of by an alien in the same manner in all respects as by a Commonwealth citizen". The marginal note interrupts it on the page. Four provisos follow, none of which limits ordinary purchase.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
Guyana's law portal, publishing the Laws of Guyana chapter by chapter as PDFs. The Law Revision Act, Chapter 2:02, makes the Law Revision Commission - chaired by the Attorney General, with the Chief Parliamentary Counsel a member by office - responsible for preparing, publishing and maintaining the edition, lets it choose the form of publication, requires every page to carry the number of the Law Revision Order that authorised it, and provides by section 9 that those pages are in all courts and for all purposes the sole and proper Statute Book of Guyana for the law in force on the relevant revision date. The portal also carries draft bills and ministry news.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: It serves two editions at once and says so nowhere on its listing. On 2026-10-06, 52 of its 461 chapter entries carried L.R.O. 1/2022 - volumes 1 and 2 and part of volume 3 - and the remaining 409 carried L.R.O. 1/2012. The Attorney General told the National Assembly in June 2026 that 1/2012 shows the law as at 31 December 2012 and 1/2022 all laws enacted to 31 December 2022, so the L.R.O. number at the foot of each page is the only way to tell which edition you are reading. Everything that matters for migration - the Immigration Act, the Guyana Citizenship Act, the Aliens Act, all five CARICOM chapters, the Income Tax Act, the Customs Act, the Motor Vehicles and Road Traffic Act - is still in the 2012 half. It must never be cited for what the law is now: the Income Tax Act it publishes prints a flat 33 1/3 per cent and has no section 36A, while the Revenue Authority charges 25 and 35 per cent under a section 36A. It publishes no amending Acts and no statutory instruments at all, so there is nothing on the site to check a Chapter against. Several chapters omit their own subsidiary legislation or schedules and say so in a note. Filenames carry a volume label and a unix timestamp, so a chapter's URL cannot be guessed and changes when the file is replaced.
We re-read it every 60 days. More about this source
«23. Investors may open accounts in the currency of
c.85:01 Guyana and in foreign convertible currency with any
corporate body licensed to carry on banking business in
Guyana under the Banking Act.»The words set off on their own lines inside this quotation are the section's marginal note and the amending-Act references, which the publisher prints down the left-hand edge of the page; the extraction places them inline.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
Guyana's law portal, publishing the Laws of Guyana chapter by chapter as PDFs. The Law Revision Act, Chapter 2:02, makes the Law Revision Commission - chaired by the Attorney General, with the Chief Parliamentary Counsel a member by office - responsible for preparing, publishing and maintaining the edition, lets it choose the form of publication, requires every page to carry the number of the Law Revision Order that authorised it, and provides by section 9 that those pages are in all courts and for all purposes the sole and proper Statute Book of Guyana for the law in force on the relevant revision date. The portal also carries draft bills and ministry news.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: It serves two editions at once and says so nowhere on its listing. On 2026-10-06, 52 of its 461 chapter entries carried L.R.O. 1/2022 - volumes 1 and 2 and part of volume 3 - and the remaining 409 carried L.R.O. 1/2012. The Attorney General told the National Assembly in June 2026 that 1/2012 shows the law as at 31 December 2012 and 1/2022 all laws enacted to 31 December 2022, so the L.R.O. number at the foot of each page is the only way to tell which edition you are reading. Everything that matters for migration - the Immigration Act, the Guyana Citizenship Act, the Aliens Act, all five CARICOM chapters, the Income Tax Act, the Customs Act, the Motor Vehicles and Road Traffic Act - is still in the 2012 half. It must never be cited for what the law is now: the Income Tax Act it publishes prints a flat 33 1/3 per cent and has no section 36A, while the Revenue Authority charges 25 and 35 per cent under a section 36A. It publishes no amending Acts and no statutory instruments at all, so there is nothing on the site to check a Chapter against. Several chapters omit their own subsidiary legislation or schedules and say so in a note. Filenames carry a volume label and a unix timestamp, so a chapter's URL cannot be guessed and changes when the file is replaced.
We re-read it every 60 days. More about this source
«for purposes of trade or business; or»Known to be out of date. The last amendment worked into this Chapter predates 2013. Guyana completed a revision to 31 December 2022 which the Attorney General laid before the National Assembly in June 2026, and the law portal has not yet replaced this Chapter with it.
The permit an investor actually receives, subject to the same three-year ceiling as every other permit under section 12.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
Guyana's law portal, publishing the Laws of Guyana chapter by chapter as PDFs. The Law Revision Act, Chapter 2:02, makes the Law Revision Commission - chaired by the Attorney General, with the Chief Parliamentary Counsel a member by office - responsible for preparing, publishing and maintaining the edition, lets it choose the form of publication, requires every page to carry the number of the Law Revision Order that authorised it, and provides by section 9 that those pages are in all courts and for all purposes the sole and proper Statute Book of Guyana for the law in force on the relevant revision date. The portal also carries draft bills and ministry news.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: It serves two editions at once and says so nowhere on its listing. On 2026-10-06, 52 of its 461 chapter entries carried L.R.O. 1/2022 - volumes 1 and 2 and part of volume 3 - and the remaining 409 carried L.R.O. 1/2012. The Attorney General told the National Assembly in June 2026 that 1/2012 shows the law as at 31 December 2012 and 1/2022 all laws enacted to 31 December 2022, so the L.R.O. number at the foot of each page is the only way to tell which edition you are reading. Everything that matters for migration - the Immigration Act, the Guyana Citizenship Act, the Aliens Act, all five CARICOM chapters, the Income Tax Act, the Customs Act, the Motor Vehicles and Road Traffic Act - is still in the 2012 half. It must never be cited for what the law is now: the Income Tax Act it publishes prints a flat 33 1/3 per cent and has no section 36A, while the Revenue Authority charges 25 and 35 per cent under a section 36A. It publishes no amending Acts and no statutory instruments at all, so there is nothing on the site to check a Chapter against. Several chapters omit their own subsidiary legislation or schedules and say so in a note. Filenames carry a volume label and a unix timestamp, so a chapter's URL cannot be guessed and changes when the file is replaced.
We re-read it every 60 days. More about this source
«US$140.00 for business persons
For Five (5) years in the first instance and an additional US$140.00 will be
charged for each five (5) year renewal.»About this source
Publishes Guyana's visa policy: a numbered list of the countries whose nationals need no visa to enter, a second list of the countries Guyanese may enter without one, the visa application forms, and an advisory setting out the criteria and fees for visas issued on arrival to visitors, employees, students and business people. It is also the ministry that determines whether a person qualifies as a re-migrant, settler or returning student for the customs concession.
Standing: Applies the rule
Cannot be cited for: The two lists sit on one page under separate headings and are about opposite directions of travel; they overlap, they are dated differently - 17 July 2025 and 16 October 2025 - and they disagree on entries such as Haiti. Any capture that loses the headings merges them into one list, and a reading taken through an extraction service does exactly that. Read it with the headings intact or not at all. The visa-on-arrival advisory is undated on its face and gives periods the Immigration Act cannot produce - a five-year business visa against a three-year statutory ceiling - so it must be cited as the Ministry's practice and never as the law. The visa-exempt list is not an instrument: the statutory list is the Schedule to the Immigration (Passports) Order, which is much shorter and from 1993.
We re-read it every 45 days. More about this source
«5. Visas will be granted for a five (5) year period;»The Immigration Act caps a permit and its extensions at three years from the date of entry. Nothing on the advisory explains the difference.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
Publishes Guyana's visa policy: a numbered list of the countries whose nationals need no visa to enter, a second list of the countries Guyanese may enter without one, the visa application forms, and an advisory setting out the criteria and fees for visas issued on arrival to visitors, employees, students and business people. It is also the ministry that determines whether a person qualifies as a re-migrant, settler or returning student for the customs concession.
Standing: Applies the rule
Cannot be cited for: The two lists sit on one page under separate headings and are about opposite directions of travel; they overlap, they are dated differently - 17 July 2025 and 16 October 2025 - and they disagree on entries such as Haiti. Any capture that loses the headings merges them into one list, and a reading taken through an extraction service does exactly that. Read it with the headings intact or not at all. The visa-on-arrival advisory is undated on its face and gives periods the Immigration Act cannot produce - a five-year business visa against a three-year statutory ceiling - so it must be cited as the Ministry's practice and never as the law. The visa-exempt list is not an instrument: the statutory list is the Schedule to the Immigration (Passports) Order, which is much shorter and from 1993.
We re-read it every 45 days. More about this source
«11. Medical Report for applicant»The sheet is a scan with a recognised text layer. The other ten items are a letter stating the reason, the expected date of arrival, the duration of stay and the port of entry; the passport bio-data page; a marriage certificate where applicable; the sponsor's passport or identity card and photograph; a job letter if coming from another company; photographs; the business registration; income tax receipts; National Insurance receipts; and police clearance.
Practical notes
The Investment Act's Part III on fiscal incentives works through the tax statutes rather than through the Act itself, and the incentives granted are to be published. We did not read the published lists.
The business route is administered by the Ministry of Home Affairs under the names Business Visa on Arrival and Landing Permit for Business Status. The Ministry links to both from its applications page, but the first address answers with the Ministry's own not-found page on every attempt, so only the second was read and quoted here.
This record rests on the whole of the Investment Act, Chapter 73:03, the whole of the Status of Aliens Act, Chapter 14:04, section 12 of the Immigration Act, Chapter IV of the Constitution and the whole of the Guyana Citizenship Act, plus the Ministry of Foreign Affairs advisory and one Ministry of Home Affairs requirements sheet.
- consolidatesInvestment Act, Chapter 73:03
Ministry of Legal Affairs and Attorney General's Chambers, Guyana · consolidated to 2012-12-31
About this source
Guyana's law portal, publishing the Laws of Guyana chapter by chapter as PDFs. The Law Revision Act, Chapter 2:02, makes the Law Revision Commission - chaired by the Attorney General, with the Chief Parliamentary Counsel a member by office - responsible for preparing, publishing and maintaining the edition, lets it choose the form of publication, requires every page to carry the number of the Law Revision Order that authorised it, and provides by section 9 that those pages are in all courts and for all purposes the sole and proper Statute Book of Guyana for the law in force on the relevant revision date. The portal also carries draft bills and ministry news.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: It serves two editions at once and says so nowhere on its listing. On 2026-10-06, 52 of its 461 chapter entries carried L.R.O. 1/2022 - volumes 1 and 2 and part of volume 3 - and the remaining 409 carried L.R.O. 1/2012. The Attorney General told the National Assembly in June 2026 that 1/2012 shows the law as at 31 December 2012 and 1/2022 all laws enacted to 31 December 2022, so the L.R.O. number at the foot of each page is the only way to tell which edition you are reading. Everything that matters for migration - the Immigration Act, the Guyana Citizenship Act, the Aliens Act, all five CARICOM chapters, the Income Tax Act, the Customs Act, the Motor Vehicles and Road Traffic Act - is still in the 2012 half. It must never be cited for what the law is now: the Income Tax Act it publishes prints a flat 33 1/3 per cent and has no section 36A, while the Revenue Authority charges 25 and 35 per cent under a section 36A. It publishes no amending Acts and no statutory instruments at all, so there is nothing on the site to check a Chapter against. Several chapters omit their own subsidiary legislation or schedules and say so in a note. Filenames carry a volume label and a unix timestamp, so a chapter's URL cannot be guessed and changes when the file is replaced.
We re-read it every 60 days. More about this source
- consolidatesStatus of Aliens Act, Chapter 14:04
Ministry of Legal Affairs and Attorney General's Chambers, Guyana · consolidated to 2012-12-31
About this source
Guyana's law portal, publishing the Laws of Guyana chapter by chapter as PDFs. The Law Revision Act, Chapter 2:02, makes the Law Revision Commission - chaired by the Attorney General, with the Chief Parliamentary Counsel a member by office - responsible for preparing, publishing and maintaining the edition, lets it choose the form of publication, requires every page to carry the number of the Law Revision Order that authorised it, and provides by section 9 that those pages are in all courts and for all purposes the sole and proper Statute Book of Guyana for the law in force on the relevant revision date. The portal also carries draft bills and ministry news.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: It serves two editions at once and says so nowhere on its listing. On 2026-10-06, 52 of its 461 chapter entries carried L.R.O. 1/2022 - volumes 1 and 2 and part of volume 3 - and the remaining 409 carried L.R.O. 1/2012. The Attorney General told the National Assembly in June 2026 that 1/2012 shows the law as at 31 December 2012 and 1/2022 all laws enacted to 31 December 2022, so the L.R.O. number at the foot of each page is the only way to tell which edition you are reading. Everything that matters for migration - the Immigration Act, the Guyana Citizenship Act, the Aliens Act, all five CARICOM chapters, the Income Tax Act, the Customs Act, the Motor Vehicles and Road Traffic Act - is still in the 2012 half. It must never be cited for what the law is now: the Income Tax Act it publishes prints a flat 33 1/3 per cent and has no section 36A, while the Revenue Authority charges 25 and 35 per cent under a section 36A. It publishes no amending Acts and no statutory instruments at all, so there is nothing on the site to check a Chapter against. Several chapters omit their own subsidiary legislation or schedules and say so in a note. Filenames carry a volume label and a unix timestamp, so a chapter's URL cannot be guessed and changes when the file is replaced.
We re-read it every 60 days. More about this source
- consolidatesImmigration Act, Chapter 14:02 of the Laws of Guyana
Ministry of Legal Affairs and Attorney General's Chambers, Guyana · consolidated to 2012-12-31
Known to be out of date. The last amendment worked into this Chapter predates 2013. Guyana completed a revision to 31 December 2022 which the Attorney General laid before the National Assembly in June 2026, and the law portal has not yet replaced this Chapter with it.
About this source
Guyana's law portal, publishing the Laws of Guyana chapter by chapter as PDFs. The Law Revision Act, Chapter 2:02, makes the Law Revision Commission - chaired by the Attorney General, with the Chief Parliamentary Counsel a member by office - responsible for preparing, publishing and maintaining the edition, lets it choose the form of publication, requires every page to carry the number of the Law Revision Order that authorised it, and provides by section 9 that those pages are in all courts and for all purposes the sole and proper Statute Book of Guyana for the law in force on the relevant revision date. The portal also carries draft bills and ministry news.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: It serves two editions at once and says so nowhere on its listing. On 2026-10-06, 52 of its 461 chapter entries carried L.R.O. 1/2022 - volumes 1 and 2 and part of volume 3 - and the remaining 409 carried L.R.O. 1/2012. The Attorney General told the National Assembly in June 2026 that 1/2012 shows the law as at 31 December 2012 and 1/2022 all laws enacted to 31 December 2022, so the L.R.O. number at the foot of each page is the only way to tell which edition you are reading. Everything that matters for migration - the Immigration Act, the Guyana Citizenship Act, the Aliens Act, all five CARICOM chapters, the Income Tax Act, the Customs Act, the Motor Vehicles and Road Traffic Act - is still in the 2012 half. It must never be cited for what the law is now: the Income Tax Act it publishes prints a flat 33 1/3 per cent and has no section 36A, while the Revenue Authority charges 25 and 35 per cent under a section 36A. It publishes no amending Acts and no statutory instruments at all, so there is nothing on the site to check a Chapter against. Several chapters omit their own subsidiary legislation or schedules and say so in a note. Filenames carry a volume label and a unix timestamp, so a chapter's URL cannot be guessed and changes when the file is replaced.
We re-read it every 60 days. More about this source
- consolidatesConstitution of the Co-operative Republic of Guyana Act, Chapter 1:01
Ministry of Legal Affairs and Attorney General's Chambers, Guyana · consolidated to 2022-12-31
About this source
Guyana's law portal, publishing the Laws of Guyana chapter by chapter as PDFs. The Law Revision Act, Chapter 2:02, makes the Law Revision Commission - chaired by the Attorney General, with the Chief Parliamentary Counsel a member by office - responsible for preparing, publishing and maintaining the edition, lets it choose the form of publication, requires every page to carry the number of the Law Revision Order that authorised it, and provides by section 9 that those pages are in all courts and for all purposes the sole and proper Statute Book of Guyana for the law in force on the relevant revision date. The portal also carries draft bills and ministry news.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: It serves two editions at once and says so nowhere on its listing. On 2026-10-06, 52 of its 461 chapter entries carried L.R.O. 1/2022 - volumes 1 and 2 and part of volume 3 - and the remaining 409 carried L.R.O. 1/2012. The Attorney General told the National Assembly in June 2026 that 1/2012 shows the law as at 31 December 2012 and 1/2022 all laws enacted to 31 December 2022, so the L.R.O. number at the foot of each page is the only way to tell which edition you are reading. Everything that matters for migration - the Immigration Act, the Guyana Citizenship Act, the Aliens Act, all five CARICOM chapters, the Income Tax Act, the Customs Act, the Motor Vehicles and Road Traffic Act - is still in the 2012 half. It must never be cited for what the law is now: the Income Tax Act it publishes prints a flat 33 1/3 per cent and has no section 36A, while the Revenue Authority charges 25 and 35 per cent under a section 36A. It publishes no amending Acts and no statutory instruments at all, so there is nothing on the site to check a Chapter against. Several chapters omit their own subsidiary legislation or schedules and say so in a note. Filenames carry a volume label and a unix timestamp, so a chapter's URL cannot be guessed and changes when the file is replaced.
We re-read it every 60 days. More about this source
- consolidatesGuyana Citizenship Act, Chapter 14:01
Ministry of Legal Affairs and Attorney General's Chambers, Guyana · consolidated to 2012-12-31
About this source
Guyana's law portal, publishing the Laws of Guyana chapter by chapter as PDFs. The Law Revision Act, Chapter 2:02, makes the Law Revision Commission - chaired by the Attorney General, with the Chief Parliamentary Counsel a member by office - responsible for preparing, publishing and maintaining the edition, lets it choose the form of publication, requires every page to carry the number of the Law Revision Order that authorised it, and provides by section 9 that those pages are in all courts and for all purposes the sole and proper Statute Book of Guyana for the law in force on the relevant revision date. The portal also carries draft bills and ministry news.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: It serves two editions at once and says so nowhere on its listing. On 2026-10-06, 52 of its 461 chapter entries carried L.R.O. 1/2022 - volumes 1 and 2 and part of volume 3 - and the remaining 409 carried L.R.O. 1/2012. The Attorney General told the National Assembly in June 2026 that 1/2012 shows the law as at 31 December 2012 and 1/2022 all laws enacted to 31 December 2022, so the L.R.O. number at the foot of each page is the only way to tell which edition you are reading. Everything that matters for migration - the Immigration Act, the Guyana Citizenship Act, the Aliens Act, all five CARICOM chapters, the Income Tax Act, the Customs Act, the Motor Vehicles and Road Traffic Act - is still in the 2012 half. It must never be cited for what the law is now: the Income Tax Act it publishes prints a flat 33 1/3 per cent and has no section 36A, while the Revenue Authority charges 25 and 35 per cent under a section 36A. It publishes no amending Acts and no statutory instruments at all, so there is nothing on the site to check a Chapter against. Several chapters omit their own subsidiary legislation or schedules and say so in a note. Filenames carry a volume label and a unix timestamp, so a chapter's URL cannot be guessed and changes when the file is replaced.
We re-read it every 60 days. More about this source
- administersAdvisory: criteria for visas on arrival, and visa fees
Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, Guyana
About this source
Publishes Guyana's visa policy: a numbered list of the countries whose nationals need no visa to enter, a second list of the countries Guyanese may enter without one, the visa application forms, and an advisory setting out the criteria and fees for visas issued on arrival to visitors, employees, students and business people. It is also the ministry that determines whether a person qualifies as a re-migrant, settler or returning student for the customs concession.
Standing: Applies the rule
Cannot be cited for: The two lists sit on one page under separate headings and are about opposite directions of travel; they overlap, they are dated differently - 17 July 2025 and 16 October 2025 - and they disagree on entries such as Haiti. Any capture that loses the headings merges them into one list, and a reading taken through an extraction service does exactly that. Read it with the headings intact or not at all. The visa-on-arrival advisory is undated on its face and gives periods the Immigration Act cannot produce - a five-year business visa against a three-year statutory ceiling - so it must be cited as the Ministry's practice and never as the law. The visa-exempt list is not an instrument: the statutory list is the Schedule to the Immigration (Passports) Order, which is much shorter and from 1993.
We re-read it every 45 days. More about this source
- administersRequirements for Landing Permit for Business Status
Ministry of Home Affairs, Guyana
About this source
The ministry that runs immigration in Guyana through its Immigration Support Services unit, and the only publisher of what a foreign worker, student, business visitor or citizenship applicant actually has to produce. It publishes one-page requirement sheets for the Employment Visa on Arrival, the Landing Permits for employment, business and student status, and for naturalisation and the two kinds of registration as a citizen, together with the application forms.
Standing: Applies the rule
Cannot be cited for: Nothing it publishes has a statutory source. The phrase "work permit" appears in no Guyanese statute, the three-month newspaper advertisement of a vacancy appears in no instrument, and study is not among the purposes the Immigration Act allows a permit to be issued for. Its sheets must therefore be cited as what the Ministry requires and never as what the law requires. Every requirement sheet is a scanned page with a poor embedded recognition layer - the headings come out as nonsense - so a reading of one is a recognition of a picture and must be stored and quoted as ocr. The sheets carry no date; the ones read here sit in the Ministry's December 2021 upload directory. The Ministry links from its applications page to at least one address that answers 404.
We re-read it every 60 days. More about this source