GECOM calls in police to probe registration fraud

Feb 09, 2023 News

Kaieteur News – The Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) took a decision at its statutory meeting of Tuesday, to request the Guyana Police Force (GPF) to investigate three cases of duplicate registrations which were committed during the ongoing cycle of continuous Registration.

In a release to the press, GECOM explained that the decision was taken after deliberations on a report on internal investigations that were conducted in relation to the duplicate registration transactions. These investigations revealed that three persons, who were already registered, applied again for registration using different source documents with different dates of issue, names, and dates of birth.

Guyana Elections Commission Headquarters, Kingston Georgetown

In view of the case on point, it must be highlighted that the National Registration Act, Chapter 19:08 as amended by Act No. 26 of 2022 stipulates legal provisions for registration offences and the associated penalties. In this regard, it is of crucial importance to note that the registration laws have outlined penalties for registration offences, with provision for fines of up to $5 million and imprisonment of five years.

As such, the Commission took the opportunity to formally notify all concerned that henceforth, all cases of duplicate registrations will be reported to the GPF for investigation, and consequent action in keeping with the relevant legal provisions.

In view of the foregoing, the Commission has listed registration offences that are included in the National Registration Act. Among them are acts of deliberately providing false information, fraudulently obtaining an identification card, fraudulently using an identification card, falsely alleging the loss or destruction of their identification card and applying for a new card while in the possession of an identification card, presenting false information or documents containing false information for registration, or withholding information about an existing registration, knowingly applies to be registered more than once, permitting or inducing another person to use an identification card in order to impersonate a registered person, destroying or defacing identification cards or documents, making false objections or statements in relation to any entry on a list, and impersonating GECOM registration officials.

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false, Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM), Investigations, National Registration Act, registrations

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