Dear Editor,
With reference to a letter by Gecom’s press officer seeking to “educate” Mr Freddie Kissoon (“Gecom followed the law…’ SN, December 24) on matters pertaining to Gecom’s management of the registration and electoral process, I am sure that Mr Kissoon will respond shortly in his own uniquely elegant manner, but permit me to offer some comments on two sections.
Firstly, Mr Persaud is correct in claiming that the Commission never publicly acknowledged any seat mistake whatsoever, but what he failed to disclose was that none other than the Chairman of Gecom, in the presence of myself, two AFC colleagues and a Gecom employee, in the offices of Gecom, produced and displayed the original Region 10 statement of polls which clearly highlighted the origins of some of the errors in the computation of the votes used to declare the results. It was further explained that Gecom staff were working under tremulous pressure and as such human errors could occur. Admittedly, the Chairman also informed us that based on legal advice, Gecom was powerless to change the results and this was now a matter for the courts.
The AFC subsequently filed an election petition to have these errors corrected; our case was dismissed on the technicality that all relevant parties were not served notice on time. Service of the notice, as I was informed by my legal colleagues, was the responsibly of the Registry and not the AFC.
It was interesting to read a recently released Wikileaks cable (Identifier: 06GEORGETOWN1162) which purportedly claims to be quoting the Gecom Chairman as stating that “he considered the AFC’s claims to be baseless”; the same cable also states that former PNC Gecom commissioner Haslyn Parris privately scrutinized the AFC data and concurred with our findings. Since the previously mentioned meeting was held after the date of this cable, I can only assume that further research was conducted which established firm basis for our claims.
Mr Editor, now that Mr Persaud has confirmed that Gecom had conducted an internal investigation on our 2006 Region 10 claim, then it is time that Gecom states the results of their investigations – who were the rightful winners of the second geographical seat in Region 10 in the 2006 elections?
Secondly, with regard to the distribution of scrutineers’ funds, Mr Persaud is being disingenuous. He correctly stated that Gecom was never in possession of any monies to pay parties, however he omits to “educate” Mr Kissoon on the fact that payments to parties and individuals were made on the advice of Gecom. In other words, Gecom prepared the payment vouchers which were sent to the Ministry of Finance to effect payment. Gecom still had a responsibility to obey the court ruling which stated that payments to scrutineers were to be made on a proportional basis. This duly could not be absolved on the basis of the reason that Gecom did not sign the cheques; it was their duty to uphold the ruling of the highest court in the land and prepare payment vouchers reflecting the AFC’s rightful proportional share. On the same note, Mr Persaud may want to inform us as to who made payments to the PPP/C and PNC for their 2006 polling day staff. Additionally, he may also want to inform the public if any payments were made to political parties to offset polling day activities for the 2011 elections.
I am eagerly awaiting a response from Gecom in regard to the above, in particular the results of the 2006 geographic seat claim.
Yours faithfully,
David Patterson
