Tabulation of district four votes suspended

―Process to continue after Chairperson receives and reviews Chief Justice Ruling

DPI, Guyana, Thursday, March 12, 2020

The Guyana Election Commission’s (GECOm) tabulation of the votes For District Four at the recently held General and Regional Elections on March 2, 2020, has been suspended.

Yesterday the Returning Officer for the district Clairmonte Mingo was ordered by Chief Justice Roxanne George to return to the process of tabulating the Statements of Poll for Region 4 and completing the process before making a declaration.

This is so as the previous declaration made was deemed unlawful.

However, as the process began this morning, objections were made by People’s Progressive Party GECOM Commissioner Sase Gunraj. The claim that is being made by Gunraj is that the RO is using a spreadsheet to tabulate the votes instead of the statements of poll and is insisting on using the previous numbers cleared last Thursday.

GECOM Chairman Chief Justice Retired Claudette Singh intervened and suspended the process.

The tabulation of the votes will continue after the Chairman has reviewed the ruling of the Chief Justice to determine whether the statements of poll or the spreadsheet will be used so that a declaration can be made.

The Government’s GECOM commissioner Vincent Alexander told the media that two persons from each contesting party will be involved in the tabulation process along with one international observer.

Yesterday, the Returning Officer for Region Four was ordered by the Chief Justice to return to the process of tabulating the Statements of Poll for Region 4 and complete the process before making a declaration. This is so as the previous declaration made was deemed unlawful.

In her ruling, the Chief Justice also ordered that the Guyana Elections Commission can only make a final declaration on the completion of the process by the Returning Officer.