THE Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) must ensure that all polling places are checked and verified as quickly as possible and that residents are made aware of these locations.This was the call made by the General Secretary of the ruling People’s Progressive Party (PPP), Clement Rohee, during a news conference earlier this week.“The PPP is wary of GECOM’s last-minute changes to the location of polling stations, which add to the frustration of voters,” he said.
Rohee acknowledged that GECOM had agreed to minimize changes and so, too, those unavoidable changes will be done in consultation with the political parties.
Deputy Chief Elections Officer (DCEO), Vishnu Persaud, has since confirmed this.
In a recent interview with the Guyana Chronicle, he explained that in some cases last-minute changes could not be avoided.
However, he gave the assurance that every effort will be made to ensure that if and when these changes are made, the voting public will be made aware.
“Changes could become inevitable in cases where we use private residences as polling places, because there are no public buildings available for use. In this case, a private resident can change their minds and in that case we have to change polling places,” Persaud said.
The DCEO stated that last-minute changes are not the ideal circumstances that GECOM would prefer to work with, however, he underscored the fact that there may be such cases.
“We will have measures in place to make people aware of the changes, if there are any,” he assured.