May 13, 2020 News
The Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) has found that it may be necessary to increase the number of work stations being used for the National Recount of ballots cast at the March 2, 2020 polls with the aim of increasing its pace.
GECOM’s Public Relations Officer, Yolanda Ward, relayed to reporters yesterday that the Commission was expected to revise the 25-day timeline set for the recount; however, she explained that that revision will wait until after the possible additional stations are established.
Currently, GECOM has 10 work stations operating daily but Ward could not state definitively the number of workstations that are likely to be added.
That decision will be based on the advice from the National COVID-19 Task Force, headed by Prime Minister Moses Nagamootoo.
Ward said that GECOM Chair, Ret’d Justice Claudette Singh will request that the National COVID-19 Task Force send a team to advice the Commission and make “on the spot” decisions on the placement of those additional stations.
According to her, two Commissioners had a “quick look around” at the Arthur Chung Conference Center, the site of the recount to determine how many additional stations can be established.
Ward explained that the 10 work stations are currently completing an estimated 45-55 ballots boxes daily, and with the addition of other stations, that number can be significantly increased to 70 or even 80 boxes.
She reported that at the end of day seven, exactly one week since the recount commenced, GECOM completed a total of 48 ballots boxes bringing the total to 311.
Ward said that 12 came from Region One; nine from Region Two, 12 from Region Three and the remaining 15 came from Region Four. Additionally, 288 Statements of Recount (SORs) were tabulated for General and 285 for Regional Elections.
The PRO relayed to the press that the Commission will also decide on cutting down the number of documents being reviewed in each ballot box.
Representatives from several parties have complained that the unnecessary queries and checks are aiding the slow pace and so the Commission has decided to eliminate those from the process.
“It was an observation that we can look at the content being examined, how some of that time can be minimized and just to focus on the contents which are relevant to the process,” Ward stated.
Among those documents to be ignored is the “folio”, a document containing images of each electorate. Additionally, GECOM the Observation Reports (Ors) will only contain anomalies that are discovered, excluding the objections made.
A document containing 25 issues and their resolutions prepared by GECOM will also be made available to the party agents. That document will help to resolve reoccurring issues at each workstation.