As the national recount of the March 2 votes continues at the Arthur Chung Conference Centre, the process seemed to have picked up pace after 22 ballot boxes were completed by 14:00h today (Saturday, May 9, 2020).
This is according to Public Relations Officer of the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM), Yolanda Ward, as she provided an update to the media.
She disclosed that so far, seven boxes were recounted for Region One (Barima-Waini), and five each for regions Two (Pomeroon-Supenaam), Three (Essequibo Islands-West Demerara) and Four (Demerara-Mahaica).
At the time of her update, she noted that the staff were working on some other boxes and were near completion of those as well.
Ward further noted that, “…we haven’t had any major issues for today. Of course, we still have some questions coming to the fore which they quickly resolved.”
Earlier today, both People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) Executive Member, Anil Nandlall, and Leader of the Liberty and Justice Party (LJP) Lenox Shuman, have stated that the process has seemed to have picked up pace. Both of them had previously expressed concerns over the pace the recount.
There are a total of 2339 ballot boxes to be recounted and at the end of Day Three on Friday, 43 boxes were completed – three more than the previous day.
These include: 10 boxes for Regions One and Two, while another eleven were completed for Region Three. As it relates to Region Four, 12 boxes were recounted on Friday.
This brings the total number of ballot boxes counted over the course of the three days to 108.
Stakeholders have been lamenting the fact that the tabulation exercise of the SORs is extremely slow and there is need for the Commission to urgently put systems in place to accelerate the pace at which it is moving.
In fact, the GECOM PRO had stated on Friday that the Commission is mulling whether to increase the tabulation time by starting an hour earlier but a firm decision is still to be taken.
The Commission is meeting again today to deal with other issues arising of the national recount, which is scheduled to be completed within a minimum of 25 days.
