IN politics, as in life, there are unanticipated outcomes of deliberate actions. There is, no doubt, that the PPP intended to steal the 2020 Elections from the Guyanese people. When they agreed to a recount, they must have felt that the bullying tactics which they employed, with good effect, in the early days of the impasse would prevail.

They must have also thought that the APNU+AFC would have wilted under the pressure from the likes of the Private Sector Commission, the Observer Groups which they have misled, and, to some extent, some forces in the diplomatic community.

So, now that the ‘Coalition’ has joined the struggle to unmask the PPP, and show the world how that Party has systematically undermined the electoral machinery in its quest for victory, the schemers at Freedom House are running scared. This past week, sections of the media, which had also bought into the PPP’s narrative, were given some of the “evidence” they had been asking for. Faced with this bombshell, many of them have sought to downplay its effectiveness. Some of them have barely mentioned it in their pages. But the truth cannot be suppressed for too long.

Thanks to the investigative work of the APNU+AFC team, and GECOM’s insistence on a recount that goes beyond the votes in the boxes, the truth is coming out into the open. While the PPP has tried to make the election about the unsubstantiated allegations against Mr. Mingo, the ‘Coalition’ has clearly shown how the PPP took advantage of the bloated voters list to engineer the heist of the election, long before Mingo’s declaration. They have been caught red-handed.

The PPP must explain to all those it managed to dupe into believing that it won the election, and also to GECOM, how such a large number of non-resident Guyanese voted for them. How did those votes get into the boxes? Who physically cast those votes for the PPP? Where did they get the identification cards to impersonate those absentee voters? These are profoundly serious questions. This publication holds the view that the large number of instances of these infractions point to a larger web of tampering that makes a mockery of electoral integrity.

But this is not the only mode of tampering that has been unearthed. There are the numerous instances of missing polling books; the case of persons voting, ostensibly with certificates of employment, but not producing said certificates; the lack of stamps on the ballots cast by members of the Disciplined Services; and the instances of dead people voting. As Aubrey Norton has argued, taken together, these anomalies and irregularities expose a grand rigging operation that appears to have been coordinated with precision. That the PPP and its allies in the media are seeing to wish away this evidence, or pretend it does not exist, add to its authenticity.

This publication holds no brief for the Coalition, but it is high time that the false narrative which the PPP has foisted on Guyanese be exposed for what it is. We now know that all the talk about democracy and the rule of law was meant to cover up the expansive violation of the law and the integrity of the elections. The PPP’s cynical response that such anomalies should form the basis for an Election Petition does not cut it. They want it both ways. On the one hand, they have argued that GECOM has the power to correct instances of fraud, as it pertains to PPP charges. But when it comes to similar charges from the Coalition, they now argue that GECOM lacks the power to act. Guyanese are much more sensible than they think.

It’s still relatively early in the process; less than half of the boxes have been audited. So, it is reasonable to expect the volume of infractions to exponentially increase. It does not show our country in good light, when one of the contenders for office is found to be acting in such an embarrassing manner. But the truth must come to light. Some organisations and socio-political forces which ought to know better have allowed the PPP to get away with too much. It is time that their client be called out, and they be called to book for aiding and abetting skullduggery.