–following field operative’s damning find

THE ruling People’s Progressive Party (PPP)last week wrote the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) highlighting some of the concerns it has with the Preliminary List of Electors (PLE).

One of those concerns has to do with the steep surge in names, amounting to over 78,000 new registrants, on the PLE, when, traditionally, new registrants amount to approximately 11,000.

Noting that GECOM is yet to respond to the missive, the PPP says in a statement issued yesterday, “The letter was sent to GECOM last Thursday, August 14, after one of our field operatives found eighteen (18) persons on the PLE with the same Georgetown address. At the said address, they found one of the eighteen people with a prepared list of the eighteen that were listed.”

Noting that it found this development very unusual, the Party said: “While it may be possible that these eighteen persons are living at that address we call on GECOM to physically verify these persons’ existence and their place of residence.
“The PPP has been submitting irregularities to GECOM on an ongoing basis rather than wait until the Claims and Objections period concludes since this period last for only 28 days and we are only ten (10) days away from its conclusion.”

CALLS ON GECOM
Taking the foregoing into account, the Party is also calling on GECOM to give a breakdown on the quality control mechanism used for inputting data from the National Register of Registrants Database (NRRD) into the PLE and who was responsible for it.
A call was also made via a statement from the Ruling Party yesterday at its weekly news conference at Freedom House, Robb Street, for an account of the critical vacancies that are yet to be filled, particularly at the Information Technology (IT) Department, and why was it only acted upon when highlighted by the People’s Progressive Party (PPP).
Additional, the Party’s statement issued a call for an International Monitoring Unit (IMU) or Joint International Technical Assistance (JITA to be implemented by GECOM, to overlook the inputting and evaluation of critical and important data.
The Party said that ensuring that there is a clean, accurate and credible voters list is the first ingredient for the holding of free and fair elections, and urged all Guyanese to expose any type of discrepancies that may surface during the current Claims and Objectives period.
The statement said, “We call on all Guyana to support the PPP’s concerns with respect to discrepancies arising out of the registration process and the production of a Preliminary List of Electors.

VERIFICATION BY POLITICAL PARTIES
“GECOM should be reminded that political parties were given copies of the Preliminary Voters List to scrutinize. Further, it is the prerogative of political parties to monitor the current Claims and Objections exercise and to report its findings of malpractices to GECOM for their corrective action.”
According to the statement, it is GECOM’s responsibility to inform the public that the political parties are in possession of the PLE and therefore will be carrying out house-to-house visits to check on the Preliminary List of Electors 2014, which is a right enjoyed by the political parties over the years.
“Given a mandate by the electorate to represent almost half of the country’s population, the PPP intends to ensure that there is complete transparency during the registration process and at GECOM itself,” the ruling party said.
The PPP, according to its statement, is of view that GECOM is better prepared for General Elections rather than Local Government Elections, especially since GECOM has shown a total lack of preparations for the holding of Local Government Elections under the new electoral system.
The party also reiterated their stand on the claims of list padding, and demanded that GECOM produce the evidence of their claims on the impersonators posing as GECOM officials in Region 1 (Barima/Waini).
“The PPP found it was quite extraordinary that on the very day GECOM claimed there were GECOM impersonators on the ground at Region 1 soon after APNU made the same allegations. This hasty and unfounded claim by GECOM about impostors was made before checking the accuracy of the allegation, put the lives of PPP activists at risk.
“We reiterate our call for more diligent work to be done by GECOM in keeping with its standard operational procedures. In the meanwhile, the PPP will remain vigilant in its efforts to ensure that GECOM generate a clean and acceptable voters list,” the statement concluded.