GECOM legally required to provide credible voters list-Forde

Sep 02, 2022 News

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…says commission must implement mechanisms to assure confidence

Kaieteur News – With Local Government Elections (LGE) around the corner, Opposition parties, the Alliance for Change (AFC) and the A Partnership for National Unity (APNU) continue to call for a clean voters list. Apart from Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo assuring that no house to house verification will be held before the local polls, the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) seems to be indicating also that its hands are tied given that the Chief Justice’s 2019 ruling specified that a person cannot be removed as a voter unless proven deceased or disqualified.

In a public statement, GECOM said that the existing legislation provides that the removal of names from the National Register of Registrants Database (NRRDB) can only be done through the legal methodology which includes the receipt of monthly reports from the General Registers Office (GRO) or through an Objections process where relevant persons can object to the inclusion of names in the Preliminary List of Electors (PLE) whom they suspect may not be eligible; and the burden of proof is on the objector to present the necessary evidence to substantiate the objection(s).

Some stakeholders are not accepting however, that GECOM has done all it legally can to ensure a “credible” list of electors. Shadow Attorney General, Roysdale Forde is of the opinion that GECOM must use its legal weight to put mechanisms in place to address the issue of a bloated list. He explained that Chief Justice Roxanna Geroge-Wiltshire’s decision had focused on the question of residency and whether persons who are not found in a process of a house to house process can be removed from the list. She found in those circumstances that you can’t remove any person who you did not find at a particular location and that would include Guyanese resident abroad, who can’t be found, but cannot be removed.

She goes on to say in her understanding, that persons who would have died can be removed from the list because the information would be supplied by the General Register Office (GRO), and persons who would have left Guyana, supposedly permanently, since that information could be supplied by the Chief Immigration Officer. “To me that is the extent of the decision and how it impacts what GECOM has to do.” Forde pointed out too that where the process of continuous registration is concerned, the intent is for persons once registered, to remain so unless they have died or out of the country on a permanent basis. “So that is the extent of impact of the case in the context of the continuous registration process. But what the case did not address is GECOM’s duty and constitutional obligation to provide to the public and to the electorate a credible electoral list.” He insisted that to provide this credible list means it must have on it only persons who are entailed to vote. As such, “any person who would have died, GECOM ought to have removed them from the list. Secondly, GECOM is under obligation to ensure that persons; for one reason or the other who cannot be removed, that they put in place the necessary mechanism to ensure that fraud cannot occur and substitute voting cannot occur.”

“They (GECOM) can’t simply say we have to accept a list with dead persons on it because we can’t take them off for one reason or the other; or they can’t simply say that we have persons on the list, we don’t know whether they are dead or whether they alive.” He said GECOM cannot just say also that they are not doing a house to house and not engage in the process to even determine who physically, at this date, would have been in the country at the time of the house to house process, but can’t be taken off. He said the process would further help to identify persons who can’t be found, whether dead or alive or out of the jurisdiction. And where persons entitled to vote and are alive but absent, “what are we to do to reduce multiple voting.”

Forde pointed out that Article 162 of the Constitution specifically says that GECOM is in charge and has power to exercise general directions and supervision over the registration of electors and the administrative conduct of all elections of members of the National Assembly and also they have the power to issue such instructions and take such steps that are necessary or expedient to ensure impartiality, fairness and compliance with the provision of the constitution or of any act on the part of persons exercising powers.

The Shadow Minister insisted that GECOM is vested with significant powers but is behaving “as if somehow it is held hostage by the Government.” He said that whilst the Government and the opposition would have three members on the Commission, “they’re not necessarily meant to be representatives of the political parties (PPP and PNC) to be held hostage to political positions” although that is what is happening. He said that is why the office of the Chairperson of the Elections Commission is so important, as it is supposed to be used to “drive consensus and drive good sense.”

Forde reiterated however that he does not believe that “GECOM has done all it is required to do by simply saying that we can’t take people off the list. They have to come up with a mechanism to ensure in respect of persons who cannot be taken off the list, that they put in place sufficient mechanisms to ensure or reduce the risk of multiple and substitution voting. It is their constitutional duty to that,” Forde said.

 

 

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