Georgetown: People’s Progressive Party (PPP) General Secretary Bharrat Jagdeo Thursday afternoon slammed the APNU+AFC Coalition for engaging in “gangsterism and crookery” to further delay a declaration of the elections results.
Underscoring that the APNU/AFC continues to thwart the will of the Guyanese people who voted at the March 02, 2020 polls, Jagdeo called the move to the Court a “disguised election’s petition” amounting to a “criminal conspiracy.”
The court action was filed by Coalition-aligned supporter Eslyn David through Attorney Mayo Robinson and seeks to restrain the CEO from complying with the direction of GECOM’s Chairman, Justice (retired) Claudette Singh to prepare his report based on recount figures.
Those figures show the PPP winning the elections by over 15,000 votes.
Jagdeo said Guyanese are hoping for an end to the more than three-month elections ordeal which the country has had to endure.
“We know the drama would have many, many episodes… this is the last element they are seeking to get a ruling to disenfranchise all the people who voted.”
The Opposition Leader was adamant that the Court of Appeal has no jurisdiction to halt Lowenfield’s final reporting and the declaration.
Jagdeo said the APNU+AFC is hoping to win the elections on a technicality and that cannot happen.
He believes Lowenfield’s alternative tabulation, which subtracts tens of thousands of votes he claimed were affected by anomalies and gives the Coalition a lead “bias and criminal calculations.”
Jagdeo is also of the belief that Lowenfield is serving in the interest of the Coalition and using his statutory office for the benefit of that political party.
“This seems to be the plot by APNU, they will not give up… you can’t disguise anything and put it before the Court of Appeal and rule on technicality. The Court of Appeal we believe has no jurisdiction and we hope the matter will be thrown out in the interest of moving forward.”
The APNU+AFC wanted the Chairman to annul the elections but she had made it clear that GECOM has no such authority and allegations of voter fraud would have to be addressed in an election petition.
Meanwhile, the Electoral Observer Mission of the European Union (EU EOM) on Wednesday said that it trusts that GECOM will expeditiously conclude the electoral process using the data from the National Recount.
The Mission statement came after welcoming the report of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) Recount Scrutineer team, which found that the March 2 polls were credible, and that the results of the recount are “completely acceptable”.
The EU team said that CARICOM’s report reflects the findings it had made in its own final report on the elections; that voting and counting were well managed “all over the country, as was the tabulation of the results in nine of Guyana’s ten regions.”
Like the CARICOM team, the EU team highlighted the Region Four tabulation, described by CARICOM as “disastrous”. The EU EOM said that the Region Four tabulation had “seriously compromised” the integrity of the electoral process.
Region Four Returning Officer, Clairmont Mingo had twice produced fraudulent declarations. But the watchful eyes of a series of political parties and electoral observers had caused the fraud to be unearthed on both occasions, and the National Recount has corrected the numbers.
Additionally, Sir Shridath Ramphal has reminded President Granger about how he emphatically regarded CARICOM as “the most legitimate interlocutor on the Guyana situation”, following the pronouncement of its Recount Scrutineer Team that Guyana’s elections were credible.
“As long ago as 2001, CARICOM Heads of Government (including Guyana’s) have stressed that the
Region had a long-standing tradition of respect for the will of the people expressed through free and fair elections on a regular basis and pledged to work together to maintain and strengthen the institution and processes essential to democratic Government,” Sir Ramphal said.
The CARICOM report had stated that the elections were credible, and that the results of the recount are “completely acceptable”. But Government nominated Commissioner Vincent Alexander argued against the findings of the CARICOM team.
Sir Ramphal also reminded that he had pleaded with Guyana not to “descend into the pit of lawlessness”; adding that the outcome of Guyana’s March 2 polls, “must be an example – not only in Guyana but regionally and worldwide – of the strength of law and democracy.”
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