Govt officially asks police to probe APNU+AFC-submitted documents to GECOM

Last Updated on Saturday, 17 September 2022, 10:21 by Denis Chabrol

Government has formally asked the Guyana Police Force to investigate immigration records that had been provided by A Partnership for National Unity+Alliance For Change (APNU+AFC) to the Guyana Elections Commission to show that hundreds of persons had been overseas on general and regional election day-March 2, 2020- but persons had voted in their names.

Documents from the General Registrar’s Office had also been reportedly provided to GECOM to establish that persons had also voted in the names of deceased persons.

Despite strenuous objections by APNU+AFC election commissioners, GECOM Chairman Retired Justice Claudette Singh on September 7 and 14 dispatched copies of those documents to Attorney General Anil Nandlall at his request on August 30.

Mr Nandlall on September 14 officially asked Police Commissioner Clifton Hicken to determine if the information is accurate and whether the documents are bogus. I am forwarding these documents to you with a request from the Government of Guyana that a special investigation be launched by the Guyana Police Force (GPF) and such other agencies, and or person(s) authorized and supervised by the GPF, to determine the veracity of the data contained in the documents as well as the authenticity of some of the documents themselves and all matters and actions of persons connected therewith,” Mr Nandlall told Mr Hicken.

Shadow Attorney General and Minister of Legal Affairs, Roysdale Forde has already publicly admitted that some of the information that APNU+AFC had provided to GECOM is inaccurate but did not change the opposition coalition’s contention that there was substitute voting. “We expect the PPP/C will soon crank up its propaganda machine and exhibit a few selected persons who were mistakenly included on the APNU/AFC submission to GECOM. However, these mistakes will not undermine the confirmed evidence that the level of vote impersonation reached significant level, as to question whether the election results reflect to the true will of the Guyanese people. Guyanese must not be fooled or distracted by the PPP/C effort to cover up it’s fraudulent acts in the 2020, election,” he said earlier this week.  Back in 2020 when the coalition had submitted those records to GECOM, a number of persons had come forward to prove that they were in Guyana and had voted in the elections.

The Attorney General has said that it it was important to conduct a probe into APNU+AFC’s claims of voter impersonation/ substitute voting.  “You will appreciate that these are grave allegations, and as baseless and unfounded as they were proven to be, it is important that the relevant state agency enquires into the source of this information, upon whose directions they were sourced, and perhaps, most importantly, to officially reconfirm their inaccuracy, for the public record. In the circumstances, I hereby request a copy of these documents to initiate this process,” he has said.

The Guyana government has since appointed a Presidential commission to inquire into various circumstances surrounding the March 2, 2020 general and regional elections.

The government and the governing People’s Progressive Party Civic have, however, sought to block the hearing of two opposition-sponsored election petitions.