Dear Editor,
The Guyana Elections Commission (Gecom) would like to take this opportunity to respond to a letter published in the Stabroek News on March 31, 2015, entitled ‘Wrong sequence’, by an individual whose name was withheld.
In that letter, the writer queried a point raised in one of Gecom’s ‘Elections Corner’ features, published in the Stabroek News on Saturday March 28, 2015, captioned ‘The role of the Poll Clerk, Ballot Clerk and Information Clerk’, which examined some of the roles of Polling Day staff. The writer was particularly concerned with an aspect of the Ballot Clerk’s duties in which it is written that the Ballot Clerk must “ensure that the elector’s finger is stained with ink and allow him or her to cast their ballot.”
The writer went on to state: “This gives the impression that one’s finger is stained prior to voting, which is incorrect.”
Gecom would like to categorically state that on Polling Day the elector, after marking and correctly folding his or her ballot paper in the voting compartment, must have his or her finger stained before casting his or her ballot in the Ballot Box. The Ballot Clerk must indeed “ensure that the elector’s finger is stained with ink, before allowing him or her to cast the ballot.” The reason for this procedural sequence is mainly because Gecom would like to eliminate any situation in which an elector, after casting his or her ballot, refuses to have his or her finger stained.
Therefore, as is correctly stated in Gecom’s Manuals and in the ‘Elections Corner’ column, each and every elector will have his or her finger stained just before depositing the ballot into the Ballot Box.
Gecom hopes that this letter clarifies any misunderstanding or misinterpretation that might have arisen.
Yours faithfully,
Richard Francois
Public Relations Officer
Guyana Elections Commission
