It seems our very electoral machine is complicit in the facilitation of electoral mal-practices

Mar 09, 2024 Letters

Dear Editor,

With effect from March 1, 2024 GECOM has produced an Official List of Electors. The list is made up of 706,439 voters. As some of us have projected, with concern, the voters list will soon exceed the resident population of Guyana which is approximated to be in the vicinity of 780,000. The school age population is estimated to be over 200,000. Hence our resident voting population should be approximately 580,000, which means the voters’ list exceeds the resident voting population by no less than 126,439.

How is this possible? This is possible because non-resident Guyanese are also included on the voters’ list.

Why is this of concern? This is of concern because the recount of the ballots cast in the 2020 elections, resulted in thousands of claims of the existence of listed persons, who were purportedly out of the country, for whom votes were cast; also, the results were sufficiently close for malpractices, averaging four per a polling station, to affect the outcome of the elections. Only a small fraction of the thousands of alleged fraudulent votes was subjected to verification by the Immigration Department.

The Attorney General (AG) has since taken possession of the documents in which thousands of the verifiable claims are documented. The AG has been patently silent, although he is in a position to prove the APNU-AFC wrong by having the claims refuted through a tested verification process. A process which positively verified that out of 517 cases which were sent for verification, 383, representing 74.1%, were verified as instances of persons who were out of the country, although the GECOM documents recorded that they voted. This would not have been possible if the names of the non-resident voters were not listed.

GECOM is therefore challenged to fulfil its mandate by ensuring that the possibility of such fraudulent votes being cast is reduced, if not eliminated. Yet, GECOM by a majority vote (the chairperson and the PPP nominated commissioners) joins the PPP`s chorus that there are checks and balances to prevent such occurrences, although the evidence clearly shows that there were such occurrences, thus proving that the checks and balances were circumvented. They also resort to the Court’s ruling that a Guyanese once registered cannot be removed from the voters’ list, unless he dies.

Herein lies the connivance. No effort is being made to rectify this proven and exploited flaw. The Judge’s ruling is being used as the beginning and the end of any action that can be taken, meaning that no action can be, or is being taken. However, the Judge’s ruling does not address the fact that thousands of registered Guyanese die overseas every year, yet there is no mechanism to have their names removed from the voters’ list. There is no mitigation of the instances of absent persons being voted for, particularly since such persons are undoubtedly numbered among the thousands of registered overseas voters, who would have died.

There are those in GECOM and the political circles, who are complicit in not rectifying the flawed system, while probably participating in, or condoning, its exploitation. This is evident in their objection, and resistance, to the implementation of electronic fingerprint identification at the place of poll. Such a system would not have names taken off of the voters’ list, hence complying with the Judge’s ruling, while, at the same time, preventing absentee voters and the deceased overseas voters, in particular, from being impersonated as evidently happened in 2020, while probably going undetected in previous elections.

My proposition on Tue, March 5, 2024 that GECOM addresses its mind to this obvious defect in its system fell on deaf ears, as GECOM merrily prepares for elections that are due, no later than 2025.

Previous proposals to implement such a system were stymied by calls for feasible studies, for something that is widely practiced across the globe; and the inaction with regard to the conduct of feasibility studies.

It seems that our very electoral machine is complicit in the facilitation of electoral mal-practices.

Yours truly,

Vincent Alexander

GECOM Commissioner.

electoral, GECOM Commissioner, Immigration Department, mal-practices, Vincent Alexander

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