The opposition People’s Progressive Party (PPP) on Saturday added its voice to calls for the Chief Election Officer (CEO) Keith Lowenfield to be dismissed for insubordination, while its presidential candidate Irfaan Ali accused him of denying the Guyanese electorate their democratically-elected government.
“This is an assault on democracy. This is an assault on the rule of law. This is an assault on our collective intellect. And, of course, this is an assault on the will of the people,” Ali said in a video statement.
Ali was speaking about the most recent report submitted by Lowenfield in which he disregarded a request to use the national recount of ballots cast at the March 2 polls to submit a final report on the polls. Instead, he reported new results, showing 236,777 votes for APNU+AFC, 229,330 for the PPP/C and 5,091 for a joint list of three new parties. It is unclear what informed his computation although the figures appear to utilise the now discredited Clairmont Mingo vote count for Region Four.
The PPP, in a statement, argued that the report submitted yesterday was “perverse” as it utilised Mingo’s fictitious results for District Four, which had necessitated the recount.
“Lowenfield’s conduct not only amounts to gross insubordination and an egregious dereliction of his duty but his report constitutes intentional fraud in that he included numbers which he knows to be fraudulent and fictitious,” the party contended.
It reminded that the CEO has previously tabulated the 10 Certificates of Recount and submitted in a previous report to the Commission 460,352 as the total valid votes cast but now states that the total number of valid votes is 475,118.
The party noted that the Constitution empowers the Commission to employ and direct the actions of any Elections Officer, whether it be the Chief Election Officer, the Deputy Chief Election Officer, a returning officer; a deputy returning officer, an election clerk; a presiding officer or a poll clerk.
Article 162(1)(b) of the Constitution, it noted, adequately empowers the Commission to “issue such instructions and take such actions as appear to it necessary or expedient to ensure compliance with the provision of this Constitution or any Act of Parliament on the part of persons exercising powers or performing duties connected with” the electoral process, while Article 161 (a) provides “the Elections Commission shall be responsible for the efficient functioning of the Secretariat of the Commission, which shall comprise the officers and employees of the Commission, and for the appointment of all the staff to the offices.”
In light of these provisions, the party pointed out that the Commission can and should dismiss Lowenfield.
“GECOM has a constitutional mandate and duty to dismiss Lowenfield forthwith, for his fraudulent conduct, his dereliction from duty and his vile insubordination and to immediately appoint another Chief Election Officer to carry out its directions contained in its various letters to Lowenfield,” it said.
On Friday, three of the new contestants in the elections the Liberty and Justice Party (LJP), the Citizenship Initiative (TCI) and The New Movement suggested that GECOM take action against Lowenfield, including possible removal, to ensure compliance with its instructions.
Meanwhile, the PPP yesterday also accused the incumbent APNU+AFC of seeking some form of judicial assistance to execute an illegal, fraudulent design to defeat the will of the electorate and steal the next government. It said the highest court in the judiciary has pronounced on the situation and concluded its judgment with the following words “Now the law must run its course.” The party further reminded that no court can direct the Commission on how to perform its functions nor can it usurp the functions of the Commission, once the Commission acts intra vires its constitutional mandate.
Additionally, the party criticised the government-nominated Commissioners at GECOM for suggesting that the Caribbean Court of Justice in its judgment in the Eslyn David case invalidated the Recount Order and the Recount Process.
Rather than invalidating the process, according to the PPP, the Court examined the Recount Order and endorsed the Recount Process, making it clear throughout the judgment that it is the results produced by the Recount Process that must be used by the CEO. “Only a demented mind can interpret the Caribbean Court of Justice’s ruling as invalidating the National Recount Process,” it added.
The recount showed that the PPP/C secured 233,336 votes compared to the 217,920 garnered by the incumbent APNU+AFC coalition.
The CARICOM observer team that scrutinised the recount process has said it reflects the will of the people and provides a basis for the declaration of a result. “Overall, while we acknowledge that there were some defects in the recount of the March 02, 2020 votes cast for the General and Regional elections in Guyana, the Team did not witness anything which would render the recount and by extension the casting of the ballot on March 02, so grievously deficient procedurally or technically, (despite some irregularities), or sufficiently deficient to have thwarted the will of the people and consequently preventing the election results and its declaration by GECOM from reflecting the will of the voters. The actual count of the vote was indeed transparent,” it said in its report on the process.
In its overall conclusion it emphasised that the recount was valid, in stark contrast to Lowenfield’s contention that the recount results are not credible.
