…judge dismisses PPP’s application in Whim/Bloomfield case
…AFC’s nominators to remain on list

JUSTICE Navindra Singh on Tuesday dismissed a court case filed by the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) which sought to have the names of 50 nominators removed from a list submitted by the Alliance for Change (AFC) to the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) for the Bloomfield/Whim Local Authority Area (LAA).

The case was brought against GECOM’s Chief Elections Officer, Keith Lowenfield and the Returning Officer, Bloomfield /Whim, Orlando Persaud. It is the second case in recent days that has bearing on the impending Local Government Elections that the PPP have lost. Last Thursday the Appeal Court dismissed its challenge to the appointment of Justice James Patterson as Chairman of the Guyana Elections Commission by President David Granger.
In a Fixed Date Application, Shafraz Beekham, a PPP/C candidate contended that he and 49 others were misled by AFC representatives into signing as nominators on the AFC’s Lists of Candidates. As such, his application was intended to quash GECOM’s decision to refuse to withdraw, remove, or delete the applicant’s name and the names of 49 other electors that appeared on the AFC’s list of nominators.

In handing down his ruling on Tuesday in the High Court in the Berbice, Justice Singh said there was no evidence of fraud, trickery or threat, and as such there was no basis to ask the chief elections officer to ‘strike out’ the names of the nominators from the AFC’s Lists of Candidates.

His decision to dismiss the case was done after reviewing a police report of an investigation into the claims levied by Beekham. The High Court Judge had ordered the police investigation on October 11, 2018.

GECOM’s Public Relations Officer, Yolanda Ward, in a brief interview with the Guyana Chronicle, said the Elections Commission welcomes the High Court’s decision. “Based on what the law says, we know that we were in keeping within the confines of the law. The parties submit their lists of candidates with nominators once you have reached the required amount, and the other criteria…then we have no basis to really say that these persons were coerced. So we have always been on the premise of that side, and so the decision by the judge has really proven our case,” the GECOM PRO said.

GECOM was represented by Attorneys-at-Law, Excellence Dazzel and Teni Housty while Beekham was represented by Attorney-at-Law, Anil Nandlall.

But the decision did not sit well with the PPP. In a statement hours after the ruling, the PPP said “electoral democracy and the citizens’ right to vote in Guyana suffered yet another blow.”

According to the opposition party, the police report submitted to Justice Singh totally misrepresented what the residents of the Whim/Bloomfield Local Authority Area claimed they said during interviews with the police. “Significantly the police in the report claimed that they were unable to locate Abraham Nagamootoo, Mavis Nagamootoo and other members of the Nagamootoo family and other AFC Candidates who were implicated in the statements given by the residents. There is no doubt that the police investigation and the ensuing report were perverted by and contaminated with political interference,” the PPP/C contended in its statement.

Maintaining that the report was tailored to meet a particular conclusion, the PPP/C said it contains various damning statements. “For example, all of the persons interviewed and whose names are on the AFC list of backers made it absolutely clear that they did not know that they were signing any document supportive of the AFC; that they are not supporting the AFC and that they all requested that their names be removed from those particular lists,” the PPP/C claimed. “This finding is repeated 12 (twelve) times in the report and on each occasion, these persons asserted their support for the PPP/C. Worse yet there is one person who said that he did not sign at all,” the PPP/C added.

The chairman of the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM), James Patterson warned of an orchestrated plan to stall the November 12 Local Government Elections (LGE). He says GECOM has been facing “designs and machinations to stymie the operation and coming into force, the coming elections” and that there is “mischief afoot internal and as well as external…I find that very troubling,” he told reporters at a recent news conference. “I feel sad to have to report to you that since my regime here, it seems to be that integrity has been put in a blind trust. Fortunately, I have a cadre of operatives who don’t yield to that sort of description,” the former judge said. He said while he understands and supports the right of anyone to move to the Courts to have their issues addressed, there seems to be a move to use the legal system as a tool of disruption. “I am not saying people who are aggrieved should not have access to the Courts, but I believe that some time, some lawyer, some member of the profession may file an action in the Court deeming, if it comes to that, the misuse of the legal system by any particular individual to have transgressed access to the Court and deem him searched.”