Elections Commission not functioning properly-PPP/C Commissioners

Feb 19, 2017 News

By Brushell Blackman
The operations of the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) have been criticized by the three People’s Progressive Party (PPP/C) Commissioners at a recent press conference hosted by the party at Freedom House on Friday.
Sase Gunraj, Bibi Shaddick and Robeson Benn said that they remain extremely concerned with the current state of affairs at that entity. Benn stated that his party holds the view that the ‘caretaker’ Chairman Steve Surujbally has run his course and it is time for him to go.
According to Benn, no proper meeting has been held since last year and Surujbally is usually absent; he is mostly distracted and is seemingly recalcitrant in the performance of his duties. “He is not committed to those things which should be properly done in accordance with the constitution of the commission.”
Benn said the failure of the commission to meet in a timely and regular manner cannot be borne by the commissioners themselves. “The constitution dictates what a quorum is for meetings of the commission.”
He added that it is the responsibility of the chairman to call meetings and his failure to do so is affecting the operations and a number of constitutional tasks cannot be undertaken.
Bibi Shaddick for her part said that the failure to have meetings is affecting the ninth cycle of House to House registration which is an important component to having free and fair elections.
Additionally, Shaddick said that the commission had agreed in principle to capturing registrants details using biometrics but this is now in doubt because nothing has been discussed in this regard in the absence of these regulatory meetings.
She said that the registration was meant to begin in the second quarter of this year but this remains unlikely since compounding the issue of the lack of meetings, Central Government has now slashed the entity’s budget from $4B to $2B.
Of greater concern to the commissioners is the fact that GECOM’s financial status under the Fiscal Management and Accountability Act (FMA) has been changed from being a budgetary agency to a scheduled three agency. Under this status the agency draws its finances from the consolidated fund and its oversight on spending is removed from the Ministry of Finance to GECOM itself.
Shaddick asked, “Who is approving the expenditures and who is ensuring that monies are spent in accordance with the commission’s constitution?” The commissioner said that she is very concerned about the lack of oversight that currently prevails at GECOM since this lends itself to financial irregularities.
According to Shaddick, when the situation is looked at in its totality one could be minded to think it’s an orchestration to stymie or shutdown the work of GECOM. She said at the moment there is a blackout of information at the commission. “We have to fight to get information relating to the conduct of GECOM”.
The government is currently looking for a fit and proper candidate to replace Dr. Steve Surujbally who has proceeded on leave before he retires. The opposition leader Bharrat Jagdeo had presented a list of potential candidates to replace Surujbally and that list was rejected by President Granger.
The search is ongoing for a suitable replacement with the government and the opposition having disagreements on the suitability of the candidates.

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