Copyright is governed by parts of the UK Copyright Act 1956, which were extended to Guyana by the Copyright (British Guiana) Order 1966 No. 79 in February 1966, shortly before independence in May of that year. A new Copyright Act was drafted more than a decade ago (in 1999, then President Bharrat Jagdeo said that updated copyright laws were key to the country’s development and that he intended to have a draft bill, in circulation at the time, in place by the following year) but it is still not known when it will be enacted.