Elections were credible; results can be declared

Jun 16, 2020 News

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– Rejects public efforts to discredit polls
– Elections credible up to ‘disastrous’ Region Four tabulation
– Coalition gave ‘absolutely no evidence’ of claims
– Created false narrative that elections were not credible
– APNU+AFC agents behaviour ‘unacceptable’

By Kemol King

The CARICOM Scrutineer Team to the National Recount submitted its report to the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM), in which it stated that the March 2 polls were credible, and that the results of the National Recount should constitute the basis for declaration of the elections’ results. The team also categorically rejected public efforts to discredit the March 2 polls, stating that it did not view these matters as materially relevant, so as to call the integrity of the elections into question.

An excerpt from the report states “… nothing that we witnessed warrants a challenge to the inescapable conclusion that the recount results are acceptable and should constitute the basis of the declaration of the results of the March 02, 2020 elections.”
This statement was made by the team, even as it considered the “election errors” or irregularities which occurred on poll day, of which it lists several. In this regard, the team said that it “observed no bias” in the manifestation of those errors, and that the irregularities identified are not sufficient, in their view, to invalidate the tabulation of votes at the recount.
In its conclusions and recommendations section, it said “The national recount process then, despite some of its administrative failings, despite some of the minor flaws, is not an indictment of the 2020 polls and the Team categorically rejects the concerted public efforts to discredit the 2020 poll up to the disastrous Region 4 tabulation.”
This refers to the tabulation of Region Four Returning Officer, Clairmont Mingo, in which the results of the general and regional elections for that district were manipulated to secure a fraudulent victory for the APNU+AFC Coalition.
CARICOM Ambassador to the Organisation of American States (OAS), Noel Lynch had addressed the OAS Permanent Council on CARICOM’s involvement in Guyana’s National Recount.

“Mr. Chairman,” Lynch told the Council, “just as democracy matters to the people of Guyana, so it matters to the Caribbean Community of which the nation of Guyana is a valued member. That is why we of CARICOM regard ourselves as the most legitimate interlocutors in the Guyana situation.”
Lynch had said that CARICOM has no interest in which political party wins the election, and that if each of the political parties genuinely believes it has won (as the two major parties had both claimed), they should have no fear of the recount.
President David Granger had touted this statement after a visit to the Arthur Chung Conference Centre on June 7 after apprising himself of the developments at the recount venue.
“I am very confident in CARICOM’s ability and integrity,” the President had said, “and I’d just like to repeat what the ambassador of Barbados to Washington said, that CARICOM is the most legitimate interlocutor on the Guyana situation. I am inspired by that remark and I share the sentiment that CARICOM is the most legitimate interlocutor on the Guyana situation.”
He had added “The CARICOM team is competent and I am very confident that the work that they will do is up to international standards. And I don’t disparage the CARICOM team. I’m not dismissive of their efforts. I went to a lot of trouble. I hosted the Prime Ministers of Barbados, Dominica, Grenada, St. Vincent and Trinidad. And I would like to see that mission succeed.”
Then, in an interview yesterday at State House, the President told a select group of journalists that CARICOM’s presence and role in the recount cannot be construed as interference, as its role is embedded in law (the gazetted order for the recount). Speaking of the weight that should be given to the CARICOM report, Granger said “it must be considered.”

‘APNU+AFC agents offered absolutely no evidence for claims, behaviour unacceptable’
The CARICOM team had scathing criticisms for the agents of the governing coalition. While the team noted that much was made about allegations of migrant voters and “phantom voters”, it said that no proof was offered.
In this regard, the team said that a lot of the issues coming out of the recount caused “excessive delay” making it out to be “a political exercise, when it was to be a technical exercise”.
It stated the view that “it was done with the political objective of preparing groundwork for a post recount legal challenge of the recount.”
The team saw the public statements of Attorney General Basil Williams on the validity of the recount exercise as a “snub” to the CARICOM team. AG Williams, a candidate on APNU+AFC’s list, had approached the media centre outside of the centre to say “our law did not cater for a national recount”. He and another APNU+AFC candidate, Roysdale Forde, who also approached the media centre later on, had said that the recount is illegal.
The team also commented on the behaviour of the party agents – not specifying a party – who showed “a level of aggression which left much to be desired”.
It noted that the presence of the agents was critical for many reasons including transparency, but noted that the conduct of the APNU+AFC agents, in particular, was unacceptable.
The report states that “The Team observed many instances of blatant incivility on the part of APNU/AFC agents particularly in Region 4 work stations which were acute during the first week of the national recount. Often these emotional outburst, loud shouts, arrogance, aggressive and dismissive attitude descended into shouts of ‘Shut up’ and on one occasion to personal insults and invectives…”
In cases where the coalition’s agents requested information whether certain serial numbers had been ticked off to indicate that they had voted on Election Day, the CARICOM team described the exercise as “bizarre”, as the requests, meant to buttress claims of dead and migrant voters were numerous. It noted that in one instance, one APNU+AFC agent queried serial numbers in one work station where no one had voted.
The team said that it viewed the exercise undertaken by the coalition agents as “a fishing expedition” to gather data for an elections petition. It also called the exercise an “abuse of the system”.
“The net was cast extremely wide in the hope of making at least a small catch and at times, the anticipated harvest ended in slim pickings,” the report states.
It said this because the numerous serial numbers being queried per ballot box often did not gather a significant return relative to the queried number.
“Team did not view the objections raised by APNU+AFC as materially relevant to the recount,” it said.
One “unfortunate” occurrence the team pointed out was that the decision to read the statements of the observation reports during the live stream of the tabulation process, “provided fodder to persons who peddled the queries as factual” and “led to a false narrative in the public domain that the elections were not credible and that massive electoral fraud occurred on poll day… [even as the party offered] absolutely no evidence to substantiate the allegations…”
This, it said, was constituted by “outrageous claims, exaggerations, distortions and misinformation which was peddled in the public domain” in clear “misuse of the media to set an agenda of mistrust and illegality.”
The report of the CARICOM team bears a stark contrast to the report of the Chief Elections Officer Keith Lowenfield, submitted just days earlier, in which he said that none of the elections for the 10 electoral districts could be ascertained to meet the standard of fairness and credibility. He had buttressed his assertions by positing that the allegations made by the coalition were found to be “of substance” after checks were made with the Immigration Department and the General Registrar’s Office.
The order for the recount had only required Lowenfield to provide a tabulation of the results of the recount and a summary of what was stated in the observation reports. As Lowenfield offered his opinion on the credibility of the elections in his report, the People’s Progressive Party Civic (PPP/C) had stated that he acted outside of his authority.
A New and United Guyana (ANUG) Chair, Timothy Jonas had said, identifying Lowenfield, that the GECOM Secretariat is compromised. In this regard, the party pointed to the need for an investigation of GECOM to identify and expel the elements which make up a compromised faction, working conspiratorially to aid APNU+AFC. In a recent press statement, the party condemned Lowenfield’s comments in the report, identifying him as the head of a “rogue” Secretariat.
The CARICOM team noted in its report, as noted by PPP/C and ANUG, that the law provides an avenue that any aggrieved party may use to seek redress, in the form of an elections petition.
See executive summary of CARICOM report on pages 11-13 of today’s edition of Kaieteur News.

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