GECOM yesterday said a recount of ballots in the hotly disputed March 2nd general elections could take at least 25 days and amid continuing fears of rigging, the opposition PPP last night said it has “grave doubt” whether the process would be credible given the voting by Chair Claudette Singh on several pivotal matters.
While the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) has decided that the long-awaited recount will take approximately 25 days, the number is not “cast in stone” as the Commission has said it will review the timeline when necessary.
“We would start in anticipation of completion in 25 days. That would be subject to review within the first week based on the pace of work,” government-nominated Commissioner Vincent Alexander told reporters yesterday after another day-long meeting.
The Commission had another of its marathon meetings to finalise an Order and operational work plan which will govern the long delayed process.
Alexander noted that while the Order is ready to be gazetted, it does not yet include a commencement date.
This date will be settled by Chairperson (Ret’d) Justice Singh after she communicates with CARICOM as to the earliest date by which its high-level team of scrutineers can travel to this country. An earlier mission to the country by these scrutineers was aborted after an APNU+AFC candidate mounted a legal challenge to the recount.
Alexander added that while there will be some broadcasting of the process there would be no live streaming as requested by the Opposition-nominated Commissioners.
The request for live streaming had been reiterated in one of 10 motions brought yesterday before the Commission by Opposition-nominated Commissioner Sase Gunraj.
Gunraj explained to reporters that the motions served to bring to the Com-mission’s attention a series of decisions which had not been made during the weeks of discussion.
“I took the time to draft 10 motions that deal with the outstanding matters,” he explained to reporters.
With each motion supported by the Opposition-nominated commissioners and opposed by the government-nominated Com-missioners it fell to the Chair to cast the deciding vote in each case.
It was these votes by the Chair that the PPP last night said triggered concerns about whether the upcoming recount process will be “credible and transparent”.
The first motion from Gunraj specifically asked that the originals of all Statements of Poll (SOPs) for District 4 received by the Chief Election Officer be provided to Commis-sioners for examination. The SOPS have become pivotal to establish the tabulation in District Four.
This request was denied by a majority vote. The GECOM Chair has repeatedly stated that those SOPs along with the report prepared by the Chief Election Officer (CEO) following the March 2 polls will not be considered “at this time”. Consequently another motion which requested that that the declaration previously submitted for District Four and the report compiled by the CEO be set aside, revoked, annulled and rescinded by the Guyana Elections Commission was denied.
The Chair has decided that these declarations will be held in “abeyance” until new declarations from the recount process supersede them.
Gunraj reminded that the SOPs in the 2011 Elections were made public at the request of then Opposition Leader David Granger. Those SOPs had been provided to the Opposition on December 9, 2011 six days after Donald Ramotar was sworn in as President.
Auditing body
Requests for a local auditing body to be present during the count, another for a live broadcast of the tabulation and one for a 14-day tabulation process were similarly defeated.
According to Alexander, the Chair drew attention to Section 90 of the Repre-sentation of the People Act, which requires that the secrecy of the vote be maintained throughout the tabulation process.
The section states that every person attending at the counting of votes shall maintain and shall not communicate any information obtained at the count as to the list of candidates for which any vote has been given.
A display of individual ballots is likely to contravene this provision. Instead the Commission has agreed to have each Statement of Recount be projected on a screen to be viewed by all persons present.
Additionally the information from the Statement of Recount shall be inputted into a spreadsheet via a process viewed simultaneously by all persons present and upon completion of an entire district, the representatives of contesting political parties shall be given an opportunity to verify the accuracy of the entire tabulation and thereafter, sign off on same if they wish to do so.
No reason has been offered for denying the request for an auditor.
In relation to the timeline, Gunraj stressed that it is unfair to invite international observers to an open- ended process.
“There must be some definite period for which their services are required,” he maintained, adding that to prolong the process without an end date is unfair to the electorate.
Gunraj also requested that all members of staff of the Guyana Elections Commission who were involved in the activities which resulted in controversy, allegations of fraud and legal proceedings in the High Court after Elections Day 2020, be removed from active participation in the recount process.
In response to this request, Singh is said to have noted that Returning Officers including Clairmont Mingo of Region 4 have no role in the recount process. Mingo has been singled out as the key figure in two fraudulent declarations for District Four. The first of these was thrown out by Chief Justice Roxane George and the second prompted the filing of contempt of court proceedings.
Singh, however, would not exclude any other members of staff as there was to her mind not enough evidence of fraudulent acts on their part and the CEO would need staff. The CEO himself has come under strong suspicion of collaborating with Mingo in the controversial District Four declarations.
Other motions related to the actual process of tabulation. The sixth motion required that the recount be conducted in strict accordance with Sections 84(6) to (11), 87, 89(1) and 90 of the Representation of the People Act, Chapter 1:03 of the Laws of Guyana.
According to Gunraj the Chair has decided to add to these provisions that of Section 83 which speaks to what occurs at the place of poll after the close of poll. He contended that this addition makes the process lengthy and unwieldy.
Also unwieldy, according to Gunraj, is the proposed chronology of the count. He and his colleagues had proposed that the recount commences with Districts 1 and 4 simultaneously and continues with the remaining districts only after the completion of the said Districts 1 and 4.
The Chair denied this request and decided that of the 10 workstations approved for the recount, two will count District 1, two will count District 2, three will count District 3 and three will count District Four simultaneously.
“That is an untidy process which lends itself to confusion as you will have at any one time several containers of ballot boxes open, several areas moving at the same time which lends itself to confusion,” said adding that this arrangement will not give District Four the special attention it requires as the largest district and the district where the issues reside.
