June 16th has been proposed as the deadline for concluding the March 2nd elections process including the declaration of results even as the 25 days for the national recount nears an end with no decision yet by GECOM on an extension.
With three days remaining, day 22 of the national recount process concluded yesterday with a total of 93 ballot boxes being processed – the highest number to be completed in a day so far since the exercise started on May 6th.
Yesterday’s figure brings the total number of ballot boxes counted so far to 1,383 out of the 2,339 generated on March 2nd. This is equivalent to 59.1% of the boxes.
Public Relations Officer (PRO) of the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM), Yolanda Ward last evening informed the media that of the 93 boxes 22 were from Region 4, nineteen each from Regions 3 and 6, nine from Region 7, eleven from Region 8 and thirteen from Region 9.
At the Tabulation Centre, Ward noted that 1337 General Statements of Recount (SORs) were generated and 1336 of the regional SORs.
The recount process which commenced on May 6th is being conducted at the Arthur Chung Confer-ence Centre (ACCC). Counting is being done every day for an 11-hour period starting from 8 am and concluding at 7 pm.
It had been proposed in the recount order that the entire process could be completed within 25 days but that is no longer possible.
GECOM yesterday held a meeting to discussion an extension of the timeline for the process. A source yesterday told Stabroek News that the commission suggested June 16th as the end date for the entire controversy-ridden elections process including the declaration of the results.
However, the source indicated that the Commissioners asked for the opportunity to peruse the suggested changes. As such, a meeting is set for today to “work out the details”.
The exercise initially commenced with ten work stations. Two more were subsequently approved by the National COVID-19 Task Force. GECOM had been seeking six but in making the recommendation the task force expressed concern that the tabulation centre was congested and GECOM staff and party agents were not adhering to containment and mitigation measures established by WHO/PAHO.
In an effort to further accelerate the process, Chairperson of GECOM, Justice (Ret’d) Claudette Singh has requested two more work stations. As of yesterday, the commission was still awaiting a response from the National COVID-19 Task Force.
“Unstamped” ballots
Addressing the media yesterday afternoon outside of the ACCC, Prime Ministerial candidate of the opposition PPP/C, Mark Phillips dispelled “rumours” that a number of ballots cast by members of the Joint Services were deemed invalid after they were not stamped by GECOM staff before they were mixed with the votes cast on March 2nd.
In a video broadcast earlier this week on the APNU+AFC coalition’s Facebook page, former Director-General of the Ministry of the Presidency Joseph Harmon had said that the national recount has so far seen a number of discrepancies. Among the issues raised by Harmon was the reported unstamped ballots from the disciplined services.
“It was clear that the majority of the disciplined services were in support of the APNU+AFC and it would appear as it was a calculated effort to ensure that those votes, that they knew would come our way, would be deemed invalid,” Harmon had said.
In the broadcast, Harmon maintained that his party had won the March 2nd elections while stating that there was major fraud.
However, Phillips yesterday said that of all the ballot boxes recounted thus far, there were less than 4000 rejected ballots and less than 100 of which were unstamped.
“……The joint services would have voted before the 2nd of March and there is a procedure for the intermixing of their ballots. The joint services ballots were intermixed and there is no report out of GECOM of any of the joint services ballots being unstamped and therefore rejected…Out of all the boxes counted so far we just have about 100 votes that were reported to be unstamped,” Phillips noted.
Phillips said it is “mischievous” and “irresponsible” for anyone to report that the Joint Services votes were not counted in the election.
“…Our hard-working joint services, first and foremost, they are citizens of Guyana and they participated in this process and their votes were counted. Their votes represent the respect for the will of the people….We are here at the recount of the votes in keeping with the expression that the will of the people of Guyana including the joint services are respected before we conclude this process,” he said.
The former army Chief of Staff noted that his party is confident that it has won the March 2nd elections based on its Statement of Polls (SOPs). “We have our copies of the SOPs. Utilizing those SOPs has led us to the conclusion that we won this elections,” Phillips said. APNU+AFC has not released their copies of the SOPs.
Dead people voting
The issue of the names of persons who are dead but who have been ticked off as having voted on March 2nd continues to be a recurring one.
Executive member of the PPP/C Anil Nandlall yesterday argued for the third time that death certificates being presented by the coalition have been illegally obtained.
Nandlall said that he was approached by relatives of Chitnanadani Ramdass to challenge the inclusion of her death certificate in the recount process. The coalition has presented this certificate as “proof” that at least one person recorded as casting a ballot on March 2 was dead before that time. Ramdass died on June 8, 2015.
According to Nandlall, the certificate could only be accessed by the party if it has received “notarized” permission from the next of kin.
He cites as support for this argument Section 33 (3) of the Access to Information Act, which provides that, “A document referred to in subsection (1) shall not be released without the notarized consent of the person who is the subject of the information in the document. Pursuant to subsection (5), in the case of a deceased person, only his next of kin can give consent to access.”
He, however did not note that subsection (1) specifies that the prohibition refers only to documents the disclosure of which would involve the unreasonable disclosure of information relating to the personal affairs of any person (including a deceased person).
People’s National Congress Reform (PNCR) executive Aubrey Norton yesterday told the media that Nandlall needs to “get his facts right”.
According to Norton, the law provided for any individual to search the records and procure a death certificate.
Norton cited Chapter 40: 1 of the Constitution which states that “the Registrar General shall cause indices of all duly completed registration forms in its possession therein, to be made and kept in the General Registrar’s Office. Everyone shall be entitled, on the payment of the fee prescribed by the order, to search the indices between the hours of 10 am and 16:00 hours every day (except Saturday) and to have extracted therefrom a sealed certificate of birth (form 4) or certificate of death (form 5).”
Norton also raised concerns about the issue of missing poll books.
He said it is difficult to comprehend that after counting 797 boxes, there are 284 missing poll books.
This, according to Norton clearly shows that 90,707 votes pertaining to those poll books are now in question.
“…You can’t determine the Certificate of Employment, you cannot determine those with Identity of Oath because there are no records but most importantly, the law stipulates that at the end of the process, a seal be placed on the ballot box and when a seal is placed, the number that would have come off of that ballot box is the seal that you would have read. (To) guarantee that seal is the correct seal is that entry in the poll book,” he said.
As the process continues, Norton said it is evident that there have been illegalities and fraud.
“…It is not solely not having the poll book. Not having the poll box is a problem but in cases where you have the poll book there are no entries which is just as bad as having no poll book,” he said.
At Rose Hall, Region 6, Norton alleged that nine persons voted with Oaths of Identity, six of whom were out of the jurisdiction.
In Region Nine, he alleged that there was a situation where eleven voted without Oaths of Identity and there were 30 proxies which were not recorded in the poll book.
“What this means is that 30 persons could have been allowed to vote without being entitled to vote,” Norton said.
