THE emergence of more and more information, backed up by documented evidence, has led President Donald Ramotar to again request that the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) do a recount.This time, however, he appealed for the Commission to look at 22 boxes in areas where irregularities were flagged, given that the first appeal for a total recount was denied.
According to legal provisions stated in the Representation of the People’s Act, recounts can be requested before GECOM’s Returning Officers (ROs) make their final declarations and another request for a recount can be made after the RO’s have declared the final results in their electoral districts. The latter request has to be made via a letter that details the reasons why a request is being made, whereas the first recount request does not have to stipulate reasons for such.
“I submitted a document which details an examination of only 22 of our Statement of Polls randomly selected from Region 4 (Demerara/ Mahaica), which show a substantial difference between our Statement of Polls and the information in the possession of GECOM in relation to the same Ballot Boxes. I attached to that document those Statement of Polls for GECOM’s examination,” Mr. Ramotar said, at a news conference yesterday at Freedom House.
CALLS TO GECOM
President Ramotar disclosed that he and a team met with the GECOM Chairman Dr. Steve Surujbally, the Chief Elections Officer Keith Lowenfield, and five of the six Commissioners.
He said, “At that meeting, I detailed to GECOM that our party has identified serious differences in numbers between our Statement of Polls and the data which GECOM is using in tabulating the result of the 2015 General and Regional Elections.
“Significantly, these differences disclose a consistent pattern of a subtraction of votes from the PPP/C (People’s Progressive Party/ Civic) and additions of that very number to the APNU+AFC (A Partnership for National Unity and the Alliance For Change). Of even greater importance, this information was corroborated by a verification exercise conducted by the Returning Officer for Region 4 at which both Political Parties were present.”
As such, he requested not only a recount of the 22 ballot boxes, but also that the recount be done in the presence of all Political Parties and the Observer Teams and that the process of tabulation and disclosure by the Chief Elections Officer of Elections Result be put on hold until the recount is completed.
“The Chairman of GECOM undertook to grant these requests. I am now aware that GECOM has met with a delegation from the APNU/AFC who disputed our contentions….if APNU is contesting this, then I believe that the only verification we can have is to go into the box…I believe that this now makes an even more compelling case for our requests mentioned above to be granted,” Mr. Ramotar said.
The Head of State also related the Dr. Surujbally assured that the recount was possible – a possibility that could be undertaken in less than one day. “The Chairman said he can do all 22 that we presented to them.”
Mr. Ramotar is urging supporters and the nation as a whole “to wait a bit longer to have democracy prevail.”
The Head of State stressed that the recount of 22 ballot boxes where irregularities in the electoral process were flagged will be “worth the wait.”
FLAWED ELECTIONS
According to him, the electoral process was flawed – highlighting the fact that faked Statements of Polls (SoPs) made their way into GECOM as part of legitimate documents; and ballots cast at some locations were more than the number of persons listed to vote, locations where there was not mixing of the ballots from the Disciplined Services votes.
“We believe that these elections were seriously flawed, enough to change the outcome of the results. We believe that the data used by GECOM when they announced the number in their possession were numbers that did not reflect the vote in the boxes,” he said.
Mr. Ramotar stressed that there is evidence enough to justify a recount.
He said, “I am talking about the integrity of our elections….we were asked about proof…they were saying that they did not have reasonably enough proof, but this cannot be regarded as unreasonable. Our view is that the evidence is enough to do a full recount, but if they don’t want to do that, let’s do Region 4.”
Initial concerns cited by the PPP/C, which were documented and forwarded to GECOM, include: misdirection by some GECOM staffers who advised voters, damaged stamps that saw some ballots not being properly stamped, the fact that persons without identification cards were allowed to vote even though their images did not match those in the files of GECOM staff, and the denial of proxy holders to use their proxies, among others.

By Vanessa Narine