Pro APNU+AFC Commissioner seeks to discredit CARICOM vote recount report

Last Updated on Monday, 15 June 2020, 17:27 by Denis Chabrol

Government-backed GECOM Commissioners Vincent Alexander and Desmond Trotman.

Pro-coalition Elections Commissioner, Vincent Alexander on Monday sought to discredit the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) national vote recount report, while suggesting that the Elections Commission (GECOM) might make a “pronouncement” on the March 2, 2020 elections by weekend.

“The CARICOM report is a basic electoral report. I don’t think the CARICOM people were disposed to or had access to the death immigration or the immigration information… I mean they had the allegation but not the reports that we have and so we have a basic electoral report,” Alexander told reporters.

Pressed on whether he supports the CARICOM team’s view that the results reflect who Guyanese want to govern them for the next five years, he restated that their conclusion was “based on what they saw” and he still believed that there were questions about the electoral process. “At this point in time, I am still of the view that there are serious questions about the credibility given the irregularities that have been found,”said Alexander, the longest serving GECOM Commissioner.

He declined to say whether he would get majority support from among the six other commissioners that the elections were not credible. “I can’t say so” he said.  With the seven-member commission evenly split between government and opposition commissioners, it will be up to the GECOM Chairman, Retired Justice Claudette Singh to decide.

Alexander distinguished a “final pronouncement” from a declaration, with a pronouncement that the presidential, parliamentary and regional council elections “weren’t credible.”

The CARICOM scrutineers report, which was delivered to GECOM Monday morning, states that the recount results do not provide sufficient evidence to show that the will of Guyanese was thwarted.

Asked whether figures so far showing that 45 dead persons and 500 emigrants were on the voters list would affect the will of the people, Alexander said the Commission’s discussion has not yet focussed on that. He again referred to the 47 boxes on the East Coast Demerara that account for 10,000 votes. Alexander reiterated that he did not want those people to be disenfranchised and that a mechanism should be found to ensure that they can legitimately vote.

The Organisation of American States (OAS) earlier Monday backed the CARICOM reclount report and urged the GECOM Chairman to declare the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) the winner. The OAS also called on the incumbent administration to take steps to transition governance of this oil-rich South American nation.