Georgetown: Chairman of A New and United Guyana (ANUG), Attorney-at-Law Timothy Jonas said during the recount what is being uncovered thus far is that the Statements of Polls (SOPs) are in fact matching the Statements of Recount (SoR), and “the only variable that is coming out is Mr Mingo’s declaration.”
Since the commencement of the national recount of the votes cast on the March 2, National and Regional Elections, there has been several instances which proved that Region Four’s Returning Officer, Clairmont Mingo has inflated the numbers in favor of the APNU/AFC Government.
Mingo had also been blasted for using a spreadsheet instead of the SOPs for arriving at the results of the votes cast for Region Four, and that those present were not able to observe what was being tabulated and how.
“I know that a lot of spin doctors have been spinning (conflicting) issues and confusing things, but there is a very simple truth to this thing: so far, the only anomalies that have come up have come up in Region Four,” Jonas declared citing Mingo’s declarations.
The ANUG Chairman adamantly held to the position that the only fraud that occurred during the electoral process was what had taken place at the Ashmin’s Building on High Street, and then again at the GECOM Headquarters, with both incidents involving Mingo “when he read from his spreadsheet the numbers which did not reflect the numbers which existed on the SOPs for those places of poll. That is the only variable.”
Taking this into consideration, the attorney observed that at the time the original declaration had been given, “and Mr Mingo read his report, APNU said, ‘We won these elections, and we are satisfied with how counting of these ballots was done’.”
Reminding that the recount exercise was just an activity that is ascertaining the ballots cast, he said it would mean that “if there were dead people putting X’s on the ballots in the first place, is those same ballots we counting that got the dead people X’s; the same ballot we are now counting that APNU was happy to accept a victory (from) when Mingo counted them.”
He outlined that what is different this time around is that the count is being done transparently, and “APNU don’t want to see the results of that box, and APNU are now introducing questions which have nothing to do with how many pieces of paper were in the box.”
Jonas noted that what is being peddled in the public domain by the coalition as anomalies are in fact simply just the records of an APNU+AFC counting agent placing on record his/her belief that at a particular time or place, someone was out of the country, or dead.
He was adamant that there has not been a shred of evidence produced by the APNU/AFC to support the anomalies “presented to the Commission in this regard”.
Further, the attorney suggested that the insinuations were not, in fact, relevant to a recount of the pieces of paper already sealed in the ballot boxes, which are being used in order to determine if the same numbers were arrived at on Election Day.
Addressing objections being raised by APNU+AFC in relation to unstamped ballots, Jonas was candid in stating that there was a public awareness exercise mounted by GECOM to inform the public not to accept an unstamped ballot.
He dismissed allegations of patterns emerging, but conceded that anomalies exist in every election, citing as example instances in which individuals would in fact mark their X in incorrect places, or even vote for every part altogether.
According to Jonas, there is, as part of the system, a screening process during the counting process that does remove votes that are unstamped or rejected. “So this is not a pattern or anomaly; this is something that occurs every time,” he said
To date, GECOM is yet to release the SOPs in its possession, despite a formal demand having been made by Opposition Commissioners.
Private criminal fraud charges have been filed against Peoples National Congress-Reform Chairperson, Volda Lawrence, and Returning Officer for Electoral District Four (Demerara-Mahaica), Clairmont Mingo whose signatures were affixed to the Region Four declaration.
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