“Flawed” Preliminary List of Electors…“The dead” refuting PPP’s claims

By Abena Rockcliffe
Several persons who the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) had written off as dead are alive to tell the tale, and while some are taking it with a proverbial pinch of salt, others are extremely anger.
Last week PPP General Secretary, Clement Rohee disclosed that Party activists found approximately 2,958 dead persons on the Preliminary List of Electors (PLE).
But after being asked several follow-up questions pertaining to this, Rohee told reporters that they would have just have to accept the information as credible.
According to Rohee, checks on the PLE for Regions One, Seven, Eight and Nine accumulatively accounted for 450 of the overall sum of dead voters. He added that Region Three’s list had 232 “dead persons” and 345 were discovered on the Region Two list.
Further, Rohee noted that 430 names of persons who no longer exist were on the list for Region Five while the list for Region Six has the highest number of dead people; 925. Regions Four and 10, separately, had the same number of dead voters; 288 each.
When asked what evidence the PPP has to confirm the deaths, Rohee said that Party members on the ground got their information from neighbours and relatives.
But it now seems as if the PPP has made a big blunder. Kaieteur News has received numerous calls from persons who, according to the PPP, are dead. Some persons have even visited this publication to prove that they are alive.
Some of the living who PPP claimed is dead, include Gavin Baynes, Magistrate Zamilla Ally and Lallman Ramgulam.
GECOM had earlier indicated that no other political party, apart from the PPP/C, had raised concerns about the PLE and Chairman of the Elections Commission, Dr. Steve Surujbally, had blasted accusations by the ruling PPP/C that the PLE is padded.
APNU’s view, as expressed by representatives, is that even though the Preliminary List of Electors (PLE) is not “perfect” the PPP is making “unnecessary noise”.
The coalition said that there were several places where a large number of objections to names on the list have been lodged, but many of those people are still alive.
APNU said that many of these persons are prominent people – “teachers, clerks, mechanics, etc.”
At his most recent press conference, Rohee, when told that some of those whom his Party said are dead are indeed alive and well, said that what is happening now is nothing different to what happened in 2011.
He said that in 2011, APNU claimed to have discovered a number of dead people on the list who were alive. Rohee said that the PPP then went and did its work to prove that those people were not dead.
Rohee told the media that APNU should now do the same, “we put our findings on the table, now they need to bring the evidence to prove us wrong.”
Yesterday APNU’s Earnest Elliot said that the coalition is dissatisfied with the “willy-nilly” manner in which the PPP is operating in this regard. He said that even some of the PPP scrutineers are upset about what they are being forced to do.