At its meeting with the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) on Tuesday, the People’s National Congress Reform-led A Partnership for National Unity/Alliance For Change (APNU/AFC) Opposition expressed concern about an apparent lack of confidence in the electoral body, but allegedly refused to talk about the 2020 election fiasco – which largely contributed to the public’s apprehension concerning the work of the Commission and its Secretariat.
Representing the APNU/AFC at the virtual meeting were PNCR Chairman Shurwayne Holder, PNCR General Secretary Geeta Chandan-Edmond, AFC General Secretary David Patterson, and AFC Executive Cathy Hughes.
GECOM was represented by its Chairperson, Justice (Retired) Claudette Singh; Chief Elections Officer Vishnu Persaud and the six Commissioners: Vincent Alexander, Charles Corbin, Desmond Trotman, Bibi Shadick, Manoj Narayan, and Sase Gunraj.
Commissioner Gunraj, when contacted by this publication on Wednesday for an update on the outcome of the meeting, revealed that the coalition representatives expressed concern about a lack of public confidence in the Commission.
However, he said they refused to talk about the 2020 election fiasco and how those five tumultuous months contributed to the current public perception of GECOM.
“[They said] the public confidence in GECOM is low – something to that effect. So, our response is, ‘look, what caused this?’ GECOM didn’t wake up one morning and have its public confidence erode,” Gunraj contended.
Attempts were being made to sway the results of the March 2, 2020 elections in favour of the then APNU/AFC Government. Already, a number of top electoral officials and politicians – including former PNC Chair Volda Lawrence – are before the courts on related charges.
In fact, it was the then coalition’s Business Minister Dominic Gaskin, the son-in-law of then President David Granger, who had called out the APNU/AFC’s attempts to remain in power despite its clear defeat at the polls, saying in a public statement that, “no one elected us to remain in office forever. There is no reasonable basis on which you can claim to have won more votes than the PPP/C in these elections. Level with your supporters and start directing your energies towards becoming a credible opposition party in time for 2025. Above all, try to regain the trust of the swing voter. You will never win another election without their support”.
Gunraj explained that it was pointed out to the APNU/AFC representatives that the events of the 2020 elections contributed to the low public confidence in GECOM – but the coalition members brushed the topic aside.
“All of the events which have led to the public confidence in GECOM being eroded must be laid at their feet…when a person from our side attempted to do so [talk about the fiasco], they obviously objected to these facts being pointed out to them and they did, in fact, say, that’s not what they came there for,” he added.
According to Gunraj, this position adopted by the APNU/AFC is “hypocritical”.
Meanwhile, the APNU/AFC also raised concerns about the poor functioning of the Commission’s public relations apparatus – something which Commissioner Shadick admitted could be improved.
“Cathy Hughes talks about our PR system, which I agree, can be better. You know, people shouldn’t have to call and ask what to do…it should be made known and our PR is lacking…that has to be fixed and the PR person has to say what is going on…,” she reasoned.
Additionally, the coalition highlighted the specific case of birth certificates being issued with varying features – and expressed concerns that GECOM was unable to confirm the authenticity of these documents.
This, according to Commissioner Shadick, is a non-issue.
“David Patterson spoke about birth certificates that are different: some that have a number and some that have a QR code thing…but the thing is, with GRO [General Register Office], they’re in the process of upgrading their certificates and they have changes that are occurring…the code is to test the authenticity of the document, not to check that it did come from GRO. But I reminded that the birth certificate is not the only source document, people have different documents…,” Shadick explained.
She reasoned that people could not be expected to go get the latest birth certificate document.
“GECOM does not tell people they need to bring the most recent version of a birth certificate, we can’t do that…,” she added, noting that “while they raise these as issues, some of them are not really issues”.
Another issue which was addressed during the meeting was an apparent breach in GECOM’s hiring process – something which has already been resolved.
“They raised an issue of somebody who used to be a PPP scrutineer who’s employed by a registration officer as a Clerk II…but the matter was addressed and the person was relieved of their duties…because that information was not known to the RO when the young lady was hired,” she explained.
“A PPP scrutineer is an activist and GECOM has a policy of not employing political activists. Now, they sat there and didn’t raise the issue that the mother of the PNC Chairman is an RO in Region Two. I mean, by law, there is no reason not to hire her, but somebody could object to that…,” Shadick added.
GECOM has since undertaken to address other matters raised by the APNU/AFC.
In a statement on the meeting issued by the PNC, the coalition Opposition said the country’s election system required substantial reforms. “GECOM should not engage in any new elections without these reforms. The Coalition further stated that those reforms must benefit from international best practices and are geared at producing credible results that will have public acceptance,” the statement reads.
However, though the Guyana Government has published proposed reforms to the Representation of People Act (RoPA) – the APNU/AFC has not submitted any comments or recommendations.
