GREGORY Gaspar, the lone contender in the elections for President of the Guyana Public Service Union (GPSU), believes that notwithstanding efforts to delay the publication of the results, he will be victorious.
Gaspar said that in spite of the challenges, he is optimistic that he will win the election against rival contender and long-standing President of the GPSU, Patrick Yarde.
Thus far, seven boxes have been counted and the results of those ballots show that Gaspar is ahead of Yarde by 387 votes. Gaspar has 542 votes, while Yarde has secured 155.

Unofficially, the Guyana Chronicle understands that for the two standing ballots which represent workers of the Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA) and the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation (GPHC), Yarde remains behind Gaspar.
In the case of the GRA, Gaspar secured 96 votes and Yarde 16; while over at the GPHC, Gaspar scored 62 and Yarde 30.
If those unofficial results are accurate, then Gaspar will see his votes surge to 700, while Yarde’s will trail at 201.
The results are expected to be released on Wednesday.
Meanwhile, in an interview with the Guyana Chronicle on Sunday just outside of the GPSU’s headquarters on Shiv Chanderpaul Drive and Regent Street, Gaspar said the police were yet again called in by Chief Elections Officer (CEO), Herman De Souza, to ensure that there is a high level of scrutiny and security for the ballot boxes at the close of operations today.

WHY THE DELAY?
Gaspar ,who is confident of securing “A Big win”, given the preliminary results, said he is yet to understand why there is a delay in the release of the results of the elections. He explained that all of the counting of the ballot papers would have been concluded and as such, nothing else is left to be done.
“I am not aware that they have any more work to be done, because all of the boxes that are remaining are supposed to have Statements of Poll and he should be releasing the results of those 12 boxes,” said Gaspar, who was sporting a ‘Refuse to lose’ jersey.
According to him, the delay needs to be explained by De Souza, and noted that the 12 boxes have been counted since last Friday, as all of those boxes originated from out of Georgetown.
“The boxes that had to be counted at the union were the Georgetown running boxes, and the standing boxes that would have been counted the same evening at the same locations,” he said, adding:
“The results of those 12 boxes, he is supposed to have since Thursday evening or Friday morning, and he has not released it as yet. I don’t know what the big delay in releasing the results is; nothing more has to be counted.”
Gaspar noted that all of the counting concluded on Sunday, and as such there was nothing preventing DeSouza from releasing the results, as he has the Statements of Poll for the 12 ballot boxes since last Thursday evening or Friday morning.
However, when contacted on Sunday afternoon, DeSouza told the Guyana Chronicle that the results are likely to be made available on Wednesday afternoon. He said that although he and his team of workers are extremely tired, they will continue work on Wednesday.
“All of the ballots have been counted, but we need to get into the Statements of Poll; we are very tired,” DeSouza said, adding: “Not likely until Wednesday” the results will be available.
He said that while the tallying of votes has been completed, he does not want to be “premature” in his utterances.
KEEPING A CLOSE EYE
Though he has participated in only two union elections, Gaspar maintained that he has never experienced such a high level of scrutiny of the union’s elections before, and noted that he along with members of his team are keeping watch at the GPSU headquarters to ensure that no one enters the premises.
“We are keeping watch! Since he (Herman De Souza) announced we have to wait until Wednesday, we are still interested in securing the ballot boxes because it is still in the building and we are out here to ensure that no one goes to interfere with those 12 boxes that he is yet to release the results for.”

Meanwhile, should Gaspar be elected to serve as President of the GPSU, he intends to resuscitate all of the union’s branches, so that “all members have a voice in the union.” He explained that there are over 60 union branches, but less than five are active (have a chairman and vice-chairman).
Moreover, he intends to have an audit of the finances of the union done as none has been done since 2006. Through his Attorney Nigel Hughes, Gaspar had filed an application against GPSU executive members, accusing them of failing to properly manage the union.
Additionally, Gaspar called for there to be a suspension of the Council so that the Treasurer and Auditor General’s reports for the period 2004 to present be produced and tabled at the Biennial Delegates’ Conference. An interim injunction that was granted was discharged by Justice Nareshwar Harnanan, following the presentation of documents to show the union’s income and expenditure up to December 31, 2016.
But Gaspar maintains that the documents presented to the court were neither audited nor were they signed.
Attempts to contact President of the GPSU Patrick Yarde on Sunday were unsuccessful.