Elections COI to resume today

Nov 28, 2022 News

…Commissioners to visit controversial Ashmin’s building

Kaieteur News – The Commission of Inquiry into the 2020 elections will resume sitting today with Commissioners scheduled to visit the controversial Ashmin’s building- the seat of all the confusions during the tabulation exercise.  In a brief statement the Secretary of the inquiry, Javed Shadick arrangements have been made to facilitate the visit to Ahmin’s building at 1:00 pm.

Several witnesses have already testified in the ongoing inquiry.

According to the Terms of Reference for the presidential CoI, the Commission will, among other things, examine, “the conduct of the Chief Elections Officer, other Elections Officers, and others in respect of the discharge and execution of the statutory duties of the Chief Elections Officer prescribed by section 96 and 97 of the Representation of the People Act (RoPA) Chap. 1:03.”

Chief Elections Officer, Vishnu Persaud was the first to take the stand at the COI

The Commissioners will look into the conduct of the Returning Officer of electoral District No. 4 and other elections officers in execution of their tabulation and declaration of votes duty under the relative sections of the RoPA, and whether any attempts were made to prevent “the declaration of the true results” of votes polled for electoral District No. 4. The Commission will also examine whether any attempts were made to “obstruct, frustrate, subvert and prevent a decision of the Guyana Elections Commission made on the 14th day of March, 2020, to conduct a national recount of the votes polled at the General and Regional elections”, of March 2, and if so, by whom.

Both main political parties, the A Partnership for National Unity + Alliance For Change (APNU+AFC) and the People’s Progressive Party/ Civic (PPP/C) have accused each other of election fraud. For the most part, the PPP/C is saying that “flagrant attempts” were made to alter the results of the elections. Returning Officer for Region Four, Clairmont Mingo and former CEO Keith Lowenfield are accused of tampering with elections data that gave untrue results of the 2020 elections in favour of the former APNU+AFC-government, while the APNU+AFC is accusing the PPP/C of voter impersonation where they claim that that party used the identification cards of deceased and overseas-based Guyanese to increase the number of votes cast in their favour. Both Lowenfield and Mingo are before the court.