…GECOM chair writes legal officer expressing loss of confidence in her ability

THE Guyana Chronicle has been reliably informed that Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) Chairman, Justice (Ret’d) James Patterson, has written the Commission’s Legal Officer, Attorney-at-Law, Excellence Dazzell, expressing a loss of confidence in her capacity.
On Thursday, Dazzell told the newspaper that she is not yet ready to comment on the letter received. Recently, the legal officer has been in hot water after it was revealed that she reportedly misinformed the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) on the commission’s position in the consolidated appeals to the Court of Appeal’s decision to invalidate the no-confidence motion brought against government last December.

Dazzell is also under fire for providing legal opinion on the state of Official List of Voters – now expired – without sanctioning from the commission.

This led to calls from GECOM commissioners for Dazzell to be investigated for what one commissioner termed as an “act of deceit”.

Since the matter of the no-confidence motion against the government made its way to the CCJ, President of the Court, Justice Adrian Saunders, had instructed that GECOM be added as a party in the appeals. In April, during the pre-trial hearing of the consolidated appeals, Dazzell informed the CCJ that the Elections Commission will respect its decision and, as such, no submissions would be made.

However, commissioners told the media in May that this was not the instruction given to Dazzell. They stated that GECOM’s attorney in the matter, Senior Counsel Stanley Marcus, had advised Dazzell to inform the CCJ that a lawyer was appointed on the commission’s behalf and submissions would be made; Dazzell did the opposite.

As such, in Trinidad and Tobago, during the hearing of the consolidated appeals at the CCJ, Senior Counsel Marcus told the Guyana Chronicle that he subsequently wrote to the CCJ requesting permission to make oral submissions. It was on that basis that GECOM was given an opportunity to state its position on its preparedness for General and Regional Elections.

Marcus informed the court that the Elections Commission could only facilitate General and Regional Elections after October, 2019. He stated that the Elections Commission unanimously voted to revise the Official List of Voters through the conduct of national registration and, with the list reaching its expiration on April 30, 2019, the process of House-to-House registration becomes even more critical.

Added to this, Opposition People’s Progressive Party Civic (PPPC)-nominated commissioner, Bibi Shadick, had requested legal advice on the matter of the Official List of Voters and on whether fresh registrations were necessary. On May 13, 2019 the legal officer, in offering her advice during a statutory meeting, indicated that there could be an alternative to House-to-House Registration for the generation of a list in an effort to have earlier elections.

Government-nominated commissioners maintained that Dazzell needed the approval of the commission and not on the request of a single commissioner, to offer legal advice on the now-expired List of Voters. Questioned by the newspaper on whether she wished to give her input on the accounts given on the matter, Dazzell declined. Regarding the letter penned by the GECOM Chair expressing a loss of confidence, she stated: “I don’t have any responses at this time…I’m not going to give a response to that at this time, but if I do have to I will do so.”