HIGH Court Judge Franklin Holder will today rule on the Court’s jurisdiction to hear an application, which seeks to set aside the March 13 declaration made by Region 4 Returning Officer, Clairmont Mingo.
The application was filed by Leader of the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) List of Candidates, Bharrat Jagdeo and Reeaz Holladar against the Chief Elections Officer (CEO), Keith Lowenfield, the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) and others. However, the Chief Elections Officer, through his attorney – Senior Counsel Neil Boston – last week challenged the Court’s jurisdiction to hear the application.
When the case came up in the High Court on Monday, Trinidad’s Senior Counsel Douglas Mendes – the legal counsel representing Jagdeo and Holladar – suggested that the case be adjourned until the ruling of the Full Court on the issue of the Court’s jurisdiction to hear the Fixed Date Application (FDA) filed by Ulita Moore. Approximately one hour before Justice Holder took the bench, the Full Court had stayed the proceedings in the case brought by Moore pending its decision on the appeal.
Moore, in her application, is asking the High Court to set aside the decision of GECOM to facilitate a recount of all the votes cast during the March 2 Elections here in Guyana while Jagdeo and Holladar, in their application, are asking the High Court to set aside the declaration of the votes made by the Region 4 Returning Officer for his Electoral District..
Mendes drew the Court’s attention to the fact that last week, the court had taken a decision to consolidate the hearing of the cases brought by Moore, and Jagdeo and Holladar.
However, Boston rose in objection. He told the Court that the two cases do not “overlap” and are mutually exclusive. “The ruling this morning has no impact on this proceeding, your honour,” the Senior Counsel told the Court.
Justice Holder noted too that the jurisdictional case before the Full Court is separate and apart from the case brought by Jagdeo and Holladar. As such, the High Court Judge indicated that he will hand down its decision on the Court’s jurisdiction to hear Jagdeo and Holladar’s application today (Tuesday, March 31) at 14:30hrs.
Based on the declaration made by Mingo more than two weeks ago, the A Partnership for National Unity + Alliance for Change (APNU+AFC) secured the highest number of votes in both the General and Regional Elections followed by the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) for District 4.
In the General Elections, APNU+AFC secured 136, 057 votes in District 4 (Demerara-Mahaica), while the PPP/C raked in 77, 231 votes. A New United Guyana (ANUG) secured the third largest number of votes with 1,387 votes, followed by Change Guyana with 919 votes; Liberty and Justice Party (LJP) with 761 votes and The Citizenship Initiative, 463 votes. The People’s Republic Party got 389 votes and The New Movement (TNM) 128 votes while the United Republican Party only managed to rake in 90 votes.
Meanwhile, in the Regional Elections, the APNU+AFC secured 130, 289 votes while the PPP/C raked in 74, 877 votes. Change Guyana received 914 votes while 752 votes were cast in favour of the Liberty and Justice Party (LJP); 401 in favour of the People’s Republic Party; 125 in favour of the Victory of the People Party and 98 votes in favour of the United Republican Party.
The March 13 declaration made by Mingo was his second. His first declaration, on March 5, was invalidated by Chief Justice (ag) Roxane George-Wiltshire after it was found that he had tabulated the Statements of Poll (SOPs) in the absence of persons entitled to be present as outlined in Section 84 of the Representation of the People Act. But though Mingo sought to comply with the ruling of the Chief Justice on March 13, the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) and a number of other opposing parties alleged that the declaration was flawed on the grounds that the SOPs were manipulated.
