Due to several copies of thousands of Statement of Polls (SoPs) and Statements of Recount (SoRs) being unreadable, Special Prosecutor Dharshan Ramdhani, QC, on Friday, requested that the trial into the electoral fraud charges against three former high-ranking GECOM officials, and four others be deferred.
Those charged are former Chief Elections Officer Keith Lowenfield; former Deputy Chief Elections Officer Roxanne Myers; former Region Four Returning Officer Clairmont Mingo; People’s National Congress Reform Chairman (PNC/R), Volda Lawrence; and APNU+AFC member Carol Smith-Joseph.
Also charged are GECOM Clerks Denise Bob-Cummings and Michelle Miller; GECOM Elections Officer Shefern February, and Information Technology Officer Enrique Livan.
When the matters came up on Friday before Chief Magistrate Ann McLennan, the Prosecution which is being led by Ramdhani told the court that upon reviewing the SoPs and SoRs, it was discovered that some of the photocopied pages were indecipherable.
He said that there are nine bundles of SoPs and SoRs each of which contains thousands of documents. As such, he informed the court that he and other lawyers reviewed the documents and were only able to complete reviewing three of the bundles which he was prepared to disclose to the defence.
In relation to the other six bundles, Ramdhani requested more time to put them in order. Speaking to the high volume of documents, the Queen’s Counsel said, “an entire room at the Police department has been dedicated to [the revision] exercise.”
He added, “We do not wish to give anyone any documents that are decipherable.” Apart from this, Ramdhani was also prepared to disclose statements from Police ranks who uplifted the SoPs and SoRs from the High Court and kept them in safekeeping as well as video evidence.
For her part, the Chief Magistrate who give the Prosecution guidance on how to organise the election documents adjourned the matter until October 11. On that day, she said, the Court will determine whether the trial will be conducted virtually or via video conference.
Attorneys-at-law Nigel Hughes, Ronald Daniels, and Konyo Sandiford are representing Lowenfield, Myers, Mingo, and Lawrence, while Senior Counsel John Jeremie, and Attorneys-at-law Eusi Anderson and Latoya Robers are appearing for the other defendants.
The Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) Shalimar Ali-Hack, SC has hired a team of special prosecutors consisting of about six lawyers to prosecute the electoral fraud charges on behalf of the State.
Lowenfield is facing three counts of misconduct in public office and three counts of forgery concerning the National Elections. Mingo and Myers are facing three and two similar charges respectively. All seven of the accused in the electoral fraud matters have been released on cash bail.
The more than 25 matters are currently before three Magistrates – the Chief Magistrate and Magistrates Sherdel Isaacs-Marcus and Leron Daly.
Lowenfield’s election report claimed that the APNU/AFC coalition garnered 171,825 votes while the PPP/C gained 166,343 votes. How he arrived at those figures is still unknown.
When in fact the certified results from the recount exercise supervised by GECOM and a high-level team from the Caribbean Community (Caricom) pellucidly showed that the PPP/C won with 233,336 votes while the coalition garnered 217,920.
The recount exercise also proved that Mingo heavily inflated the figures in Region Four – Guyana’s largest voting District – in favour of the then caretaker APNU/AFC regime.
Earlier this month, GECOM terminated the employment contracts of Lowenfield, Myers, and Mingo after Government-nominated election commissioners moved motions in that regard.
This move has been met with satisfaction among stakeholders who hailed it as a step in the right direction to restoring public confidence in GECOM as it is gearing up to hold Local Government Elections.
