– says US Congresswoman Yvette Clarke
“We are monitoring, from the Congressional side, all of the various players that are either interfering or trying to put their thumbs on the scale of the elections in Guyana.”
Those were the thoughts of United States Congresswoman Yvette Clarke who was on Friday night responding to questions posed by social activist Mark Benschop on his radio programme, “Straight Up”, as regards interference and threats made to the electoral process here in Guyana by officials of the US State Department.
The results of the elections of March, 2, 2020 are still to be declared, and back-and- forth movements within the courts here, as well as a recent recount process have seen their release being delayed by almost three months.
Added to this, a number of officials of the US Congress and State Department have been pronouncing on the process, and even making veiled threats as to what action the US and the wider international community are likely to take, should the results not go a certain way.
Among those officials is Assistant Secretary in the US Department of State’s Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs, Michael Kozak who has been constantly sharing his views on Twitter about the Guyana situation.
On Benschop Radio 107.1FM on Friday night, Congresswoman Clarke began by saying that the United States, under the Donald Trump administration, is corrupt on many levels, and that it is “a travesty” that the principles on which the US Government stands are being diminished, because, the way it is structured, the playing field is seen as equal at every level of governance.
A Democratic member of the US House of Representatives for the State of New York, Congresswoman Clarke is maintaining that the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) must be free to do its job without interference from any group, “so this can be a free and fair elections”.
A Brooklyn native of Jamaican heritage, Clarke was elected to the House of Representatives in November 2006 and today represents the Ninth Congressional District of New York.
LONG-AWAITED REPORT
Here in Guyana, Chief Elections Officer (CEO), Keith Lowenfield, was expected to hand over his report on the national recount to GECOM Chairman Justice (Ret’d) Claudette Singh on Saturday.
That report, which is to comprise a tabulation of the votes cast at the March 2, 2020 General and Regional Elections, will also include a summary of the observation reports for each of the 10 Electoral Districts. It is in these observation reports that the incumbent A Partnership for National Unity + Alliance For Change (APNU+AFC) Coalition, has primarily highlighted over 6,000 cases it believes are tied to electoral fraud. According to the APNU+AFC, close to 90,000 votes have been compromised as a result of these suspected fraudulent acts.
These cases include: Missing Official Lists of Electors; ballots for one region being cast in another; ballots cast for the dead and persons who have migrated; persons voting without proper identification; persons voting outside of their districts without employment documents; large numbers of improperly stamped ballots at locations where Disciplined Services members voted; missing poll books; and documents from one polling station being found in the ballot boxes of another.
The Guyana Chronicle reported on Saturday that, notably, on the eve of the submission, reports surfaced that the Elections Secretariat has confirmed that the names of the 48 persons for whom death certificates have been produced were ticked off on the Official List of Electors (OLE) as having voted.
There is already division amongst government-nominated and opposition-nominated commissioners with regard to what should be done about the claimed and observed irregularities.
The People’s Progressive Party Civic (PPP/C) has argued that every election will produce margins of error, and the ones discovered by the Coalition are minimal. However, the APNU+AFC is holding fast that there are “clearly-linked” patterns amongst the irregularities which invalidated votes cast for the party. It is also steadfast in its position that fraudulent votes ought not to be counted, and that GECOM has the responsibility to deliver credible results to the electorate.
Source: https://issuu.com/guyanachroniclee-paper/docs/guyana_chronicle_e-paper_6-14-2020