GECOM ensure it hired compromised staff to facilitate electoral fraud – ANUG Chairman

Georgetown: “The whole of Guyana know GECOM has been compromised, one only has to look for Clairmont Mingo and ask his whereabouts today to agree with me- GECOM has been compromised,” Chairman of A New and United Guyana (ANUG) Timothy Jonas said.

Chairman of a ANUG Timothy Jonas

At the Arthur Chung Conference Center Saturday where a national recount of ballots from the March 2 elections is ongoing, Jonas said GECOM’s Secretariat, headed by Chief Elections Officer Keith Lowenfield, is compromised.

The fraudulent declarations that were proclaimed for Region Four by Clairmont Mingo on March 13, at the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) headquarters stand on the Commission’s record until they are replaced by results from the National Recount exercise.

Jonas, an Attorney at Law noted “it is well and good to say they’re [GECOM Secretariat] autonomous, they’re independent and they must do their job but you hire some people and you don’t hire some and you have a good reason for it. Right now it is my fear and it is my belief that the people we’ve hired to do this job are compromised.”

The National Recount Exercise has since shown Mingo inflated votes heavily in favour of the incumbent A Partnership National Unity/ Alliance For Change (APNU/AFC).

Former Jamaica Prime Minister Bruce Golding, who had led the Organisation of American States’ Electoral Observation Mission (OAS-EOM) to monitor Guyana’s March 2 General and Regional Elections, said he has never seen such a blatant attempt to alter elections results.

Underscoring that he has no confidence in the GECOM’s Secretariat, Jonas said “I have no confidence in the Secretariat, we know who their members are –the CEO is Lowenfield, next one down is Roxanne Myers, next one down is Hetsberger. I don’t know these people personally but we have seen their actions, we’ve seen their conduct, I think we can all agree none of them have voted PPP.”

Meanwhile, ANUG has written a letter to the Chairman of the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) cautioning the electoral body against moves to investigate allegations made by the incumbent Government that persons who migrated voted on March 2.

The letter, addressed to the Chairperson of GECOM Justice (rt’d) Claudette Singh and dated May 29 states that “…the conduct of a trial to receive evidence from external sources to ascertain the truth of the APNU claims that GECOM’s records of what transpired on election day and who voted on that day is beyond the ambit of GECOM’s function.”

Below is a copy of the letter: