The members of the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) are expected to spend today working on a draft Order, the provisions of which will guide the National Recount of votes from the March 2nd general elections.
Up to press time last evening, the Commission had not received an invitation to any scheduled meeting but individual Commissioners had indicated to Stabroek News that they had received and were “going over” the proposed Order. More than seven weeks after the general elections a result has not been declared and much of the criticism for this has been levelled at GECOM Chair, Justice (ret’d) Claudette Singh.
The Order is one of four documents which Singh had requested as the commission moves to finalize logistical arrangement for the process. The other three documents include a report from the Ministry of Public Health on its findings and recommendations following an inspection of the Arthur Chung Convention Centre (ACCC) and a logistical plan from the secretariat which should provide timelines and required resources for the operations of a 10-station tabulation centre working for 10 hours daily.
The final communication expected was a response from the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) to the provisions which have been finalized by the National COVID-19 Taskforce. On Monday the task force agreed to have the members of the CARICOM high level team undergo testing for COVID-19 before travelling to Guyana.
Stabroek News was unable up to press time to ascertain whether any of these submissions had been received by the Chair.
The Order being examined has been drafted by Opposition-nominated Com-missioner Sase Gunraj who said that he would not publicly comment on what was essentially “a working paper that has not had the benefit of the discussion at the level of the Commission.”
Government-nominated Commissioner Vincent Alexander, in an invited comment noted that the order drafted by Gunraj reflected the proposal put to the Commission by the Opposition-nominated Commissioner.
That proposal had called for a simultaneous count of Regions 1 and 4 which would see both Regions completed before another Region is started.
The Opposition and other stakeholders have repeatedly called for a recount of Region 4 noting that it was invalidated declarations in this Region which has stalled the process of 2020 General and Regional Elections.
Returning Officer Clairmonte Mingo whose first declaration was vitiated by the High Court has been accused of making a second fraudulent declaration based on invalidated Statements of Poll.
