Latest update March 24th, 2025 7:05 AM

Guyana's largest selling daily and New York's most popular weekly

Latest News

Revised List of Electors by December 24 –GECOM CEO

Dec 19, 2019 News

The Revised List of Electors, (RLE) will be ready by December 29, Chief Elections Officer of the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) Keith Lowenfield told a media conference yesterday.
Lowenfield explained that GECOM is pushing towards getting the revised list circulated and vetted in 21 days. The 21 days of claims and objections are set to commence on January 5, 2020.
The CEO stressed the need for GECOM to produce a credible list of electors. He said that for this reason GECOM is at pains to ensure that the list is adequately scrutinised.
Speaking on the five-day verification exercise for the list of new registrants, Lowenfield told reporters that he will meet with the scrutineers to operationalise the conduct of the exercise.
He said that the Commission will need all hands on deck to complete house-to-house verification of 16,000 names in the space of five days.
“We have permanent staff on board as well as those persons who worked with GECOM during the recent truncated house -to-house exercise. They will work over the course of the five days.”
He said too that the Commission will, at the next statutory meeting, deliberate on the new names as well as the list that was subject to claims and objections exercise.
“For those persons who are not found, GECOM will determine what course of action will be taken at the next statutory meeting.
On Tuesday, GECOM in a majority decision agreed to conduct a house-to-house verification of new registrants, which number approximately 16,000 persons. PPP-nominated Commissioner, Sase Gunraj, told the press that the verification of the data will be conducted within the next five days.
He noted that “Our hope is that the GECOM staffers will pursue this exercise with the type of diligence that it requires to provide satisfaction to the electorate, to the public and all those concerned who have an interest in our having free, fair, transparent and peaceful elections,” he said.
He explained that there has been a list of 20,000 unverified new registrants. Of the 20,000, Gunraj noted that about 4,020 of the persons were duplicates on the preliminary list of electors. That brought the list of new registrants to about 16,000.
Government-appointed Commissioner Vincent Alexander expressed his disappointment at the decision, calling the verification process “useless”.
He told reporters that there is no need for the verification exercise.
“As far as I am concerned, nothing else is to be done, because those duplicates could have been investigated and hearings conducted.”
It got to the point where we have done an internal side-by-side comparison of the information… Field exercise has nothing to do with duplicates,” Alexander said.
He noted, “It’s a decision GECOM could have made, but I wouldn’t say it is illegal; it is useless,” he added.
Last month, GECOM launched a verification exercise after it noticed striking disparities in the cross-matched data that had returned from the overseas supplier.
Gemalto, an international digital security company, was contracted by GECOM to cross-match the house-to-house data.
Both tranches of data were returned and they appeared to indicate that there are about 60,000 total new registrants. This unusually high figure prompted the Secretariat to conduct its own assessment of the cross-matched data.

Similar Articles

The Glenn Lall Show|| March, 17th, 2025

Follow on Tik Tok @Glennlall

THE BLUNT OF THE DAY

Sports

Waramuri stuns Vreed-en-Hoop 7-1, as Bush Lot topple Ann’s Grove

Waramuri stuns Vreed-en-Hoop 7-1, as Bush Lot topple Ann’s Grove

Mar 24, 2025

-Milo/Massy U18 Football C/ship Round II Kaieteur Sports- The Petra Organisation wrapped up the second round of the 2025 Milo/Massy Under-18 Boys’ Football Championship yesterday at the Ministry of...
Read More
NSC, Office of the DPP host meeting on Criminal Law and Sexual Offences Act

NSC, Office of the DPP host meeting on Criminal...

Mar 24, 2025

Hetmyer’s Blazing Knock in Vain as Sunrisers Sink Royals in Run-Fest

Hetmyer’s Blazing Knock in Vain as...

Mar 24, 2025

GOA and Paraguayan Olympic Committee sign historic Memorandum of Understanding

GOA and Paraguayan Olympic Committee sign...

Mar 24, 2025

Archery Guyana commends Chung’s outstanding performance

Archery Guyana commends Chung’s outstanding...

Mar 24, 2025

Reliance Hustlers delighted for Youth Programme support from First Lady

Reliance Hustlers delighted for Youth Programme...

Mar 23, 2025

Features/Columnists

  • Development for whom?

    Peeping Tom… Kaieteur News- The Vice President of Guyana, Bharrat Jagdeo, has declared with great confidence that there... more

Publisher’s Note

Freedom of speech is our core value at Kaieteur News. If the letter/e-mail you sent was not published, and you believe that its contents were not libellous, let us know, please contact us by phone or email.

Feel free to send us your comments and/or criticisms.
Contact: 624-6456; 225-8452; 225-8458; 225-8463; 225-8465; 225-8473 or 225-8491.
Or by Email: [email protected] / [email protected]

Weekend Cartoon

Bridge Watch

Demerara Harbour Bridge

> Berbice Bridge […]