…says agents armed with immigration, death records of persons who voted
THE APNU-AFC coalition, in an organised manner, will be highlighting to the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) evidence of persons who would have voted at the recent regional and general elections, but who are known to have either been deceased or migrated.
This method includes death certificates and the migration records of these individuals, documents which would serve as hard proof to the Commission, which has requested the same. For these persons in question, especially those that are still alive, the Commission has asked that the party utilise the individual’s ballot serial number instead of their names.
Coming out of the Centre on Thursday, shortly after Day Two of the recount commenced, Minister of Public Infrastructure David Patterson, representing the APNU/AFC said: “We have a team in the background providing all the serial numbers to our agents before the boxes are open, so that we can give them as much information as possible; we have death certificates, we have migration records, we have very reliable information.”
On Wednesday, Patterson and several others had raised the issue that there were around 15 discrepancies the party had found, the majority of which had to do with dead voters or migrant ones.
At the close of the day on Wednesday, GECOM’s Public Relations Officer Yolanda Ward told reporters said that the Commission had taken note of these concerns and, providing that there is proof to support the claims, will deliberate on how these matters will be addressed.
IN THE PUBLIC DOMAIN
“For us at GECOM, we have not sought any authenticity as it relates to that information, but I’m sure, now that it’s in the public domain, it is something that the Commission will have to deliberate on and provide some guidance going forward,” she had said.
Patterson’s hope on Thursday was that before the first round of ballot boxes are dealt with, the Commission would decide on how it plans to deal with the matter.
“We took their word; they said they would have a resolution to certain issues, so I don’t hope for another round of ballot boxes to be opened without us having some clear directions on what we can do and what will be allowed,” he said.
This is even as a photograph has been going the rounds on social media since Thursday of a deceased man named Emanuel Williams, who allegedly still voted at a polling station at the Karawab Primary School.
In a letter to GECOM Chair, Justice (ret’d) Claudette Singh, APNU+AFC Election Agent Joseph Harmon said that the party is concerned about the voting of persons purported to be electors, and that GECOM should make provision for such objections to be attended to during the recount.
“After one day of the recount, instances of the dead and electors not present in Guyana on Elections Day have surfaced. In the circumstance, we request that any information capable of sufficiently identifying the elector should be accepted by the Counting Officer,” he said.
As the Commission hopes to address the matter, Commissioner Vincent Alexander has noted that such cases are difficult to decide upon, as, while someone may have died, how the Commission identifies the said person’s vote is the question.
Even so, Patterson said that the APNU/AFC will make use of the recount as an opportunity not only to point out such anomalies, but to finally conclude on the victor of the 2020 General and Regional Elections.
The political party is also actively comparing the Statement of Record Statements of Recount (SORs) to data from the previous Statements of Poll (SOPs) to see what differences arise.
“We’re doing that right now, and we’re supposed to have a live feed some time. As I said yesterday, there are some [ballots] that would have already been moved from one side to the other side; we are comparing them with the new cleared figures,” the Minister said, adding:
“As it is, we have an opportunity for a recount so therefore we’re going through it to provide as much evidence as we can on the process and how the process transpired, how persons voted and, eventually, who was the successful winner.”
However, by the end of the day, Ward updated the media that the Commission had not yet deliberated on the matter
Source: https://issuu.com/guyanachroniclee-paper/docs/guyana_chronicle_epaper_05_08_2020