Chairman of the Guyana Elections Commission (Gecom) Dr Steve Surujbally last evening appealed to all political parties and citizenry to let peace and tranquility prevail as Chief Election Officer Keith Lowenfield reported that apart from a few glitches the country’s national and regional elections went smoothly yesterday.
“Allow me to make an appeal to the citizenry, to the political parties that are contesting these elections that peace and tranquility must prevail. This peace and tranquility cannot prevail within an environment of turbulence,” Dr Surujbally told reporters last evening during a press conference at the commission’s Kingston command centre.
He then requested that persons milling around polling stations disperse and go home and revealed that he had “demanded it almost” for leaders of the two major political parties to explain to their loyalists that the ballot boxes are of a lesser import than the statements of poll that would be pasted conspicuously outside the polling station.
“We are saying that once that statement of poll is posted outside of the station then the ballot boxes and the content of the ballot boxes really are for historical relevance, clearly there is nothing that you can do to disrupt at this point and time what has happened over the last 12 hours during the polling period,” an obviously riled up Surujbally said.
Dr Surujbally said he had spoken to President Donald Ramotar who was prepared to endorse what he was saying and while he had not spoken to APNU’s presidential candidate David Granger he had spoken to Dr Rupert Roopnaraine who had indicated he would have conveyed the message to Granger.
The chairman said there had been episodes of turbulence and the political leaders must address the citizenry as they cannot allow a “beautifully” run election to be undermined or destroyed.
He later said it was vexatious to see all they have prepared during the electoral period being threatened and that “would make anybody’s blood boil.” He said his is country very dear to him and to see what he would have experienced in his youth come to pass under his watch is not very helpful. Expanding later on this the chairman referred to the February 1962 riots.
Over 500,000 voters were expected to cast their ballots at the 2,299 polling stations across the country yesterday.
Asked about reports that at least four persons claimed that when they turned up to vote they were told that they voted already both the chairman and the CEO said it was virtually impossible for this to happen because of the great lengths the commission went to, to ensure that the system was fool proof. This issue was raised by the PPP/C at a press conference the party held earlier in the day.
Not opened on time
And at an earlier press conference in the day and his first as CEO on elections day Lowenfield had told the media that while they started their work very early to ensure that the polling stations were opened on time there were a few instances where this did not occur “due to very many factors beyond Gecom’s control.”
He also revealed that at five locations across the country there were instances where the six digit stamps, which is used to stamp each ballot casted, were broken but once the information was received every effort was made for to have this corrected. He explained that what happened in some instances one or two of the digits fell off and this happened at Central High School, in District 6 on two occasions and in District Two.
“That has been rectified, we have provided additional stamps to all the districts from two, four, six, five and ten when we deployed our material…we had provided adequate amount for the hinterland so should such a scenario would have arisen they would have adequate in their location,” Lowenfield said.
Addressing this issue, Surujbally said where the stamps are being sourced in the future would be discussed, adding that they were sourced from one of the better agencies, Code International, which has never let the commission down. Surujbally did point out that the commission has had a long history with the company and that this is the first time such issues have arisen.
“It is nothing that we knew, we tested them and they were functioning at that time, I am particularly disturbed about that because I feel…we paid our good money for the stamps…” he said.
The chairman said maybe one of the mistakes is encouraging people to go and vote early and as a result there are hundreds of people who turn up early and then they complain about having to wait. He suggested that that the request for voters to vote early should be revisited. Another issue raised by the chairman was voters turning up to vote with the old decommissioned identification cards which resulted in them voting via oath once their names are on the list or returning home for the identification card currently being used. There were also reports of polling staff being disrespectful to persons in Region 3 and the chairman said this was being investigated as the staff should understand that the electorate is their employer.
“We better get that message over clear, they are not to be treated impolitely or disrespectfully,” he said.
There were complaints of police officers being inside the polling stations which should not be. They were to be outside.
Asked about the process that should be observed where photographs of government officials-such as President Donald Ramotar and Education Minister Priya Manickchand—were in classrooms that were being used as polling stations, Lowenfield said staff are aware that they should be removed or covered. Surujbally doubted this newspaper’s report that there was one such incident in one of the polling stations at the St Gabriel’s Primary School, which saw APNU candidate Keith Scott having to bring the issue to the attention of officials who then removed the photographs. This was witnessed by this newspaper’s reporter. A member of the public after witnessing the response by Dr Surujbally to the issue during the press conference aired called into this newspaper and informed that such photographs were also seen in polling stations at the Cummings Lodge Secondary School.
He said there was also the “unfortunate situation” in district three where the presiding officer instead of providing to electors the ordinary ballot they issued tendered ballots in seven instances.
“Fortunately for us when they discovered that the electors were within the vicinity and the DECO which is operating in district three and two today was able to take corrective actions,” he said.
