Former President Bharrat Jagdeo

– discloses PPP’s plan to push for massive reforms 

By Michael Younge

Former President Bharrat Jagdeo says that the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) has failed the country because of its inability to deliver free, fair and transparent elections in 2015 explaining that it is time for a spate of reforms to be piloted to strengthen the entity and exclude undue political interference.

Jagdeo, speaking during an exclusive interview on Television Guyana Channel 28’s (TVG 28) Under the Microscope Show, said that GECOM still has a lot of burning questions to answer following what he described as the fraudulent and rigged May 11 General and Regional Elections which saw the A Partnership for National Unity and Alliance for Change  (APNU/AFC) coalition forming the new Government with a one-seat majority. They ousted the Peoples Progressive Party Civic into the opposition benches after 23 years in office.

“We are hoping to get some of these answers from the elections petition that we filed which has outlined the many deficiencies associated with those elections and how we thought that the results do not reflect the will of the people”, Jagdeo said during the 90-minute unedited interview which was aired on Friday evening for the first time.

GECOM Chief Elections Officer Keith Lowenfield

Jagdeo said that the petition will give Guyanese an insight as to the inner workings of all those bodies with the GECOM infrastructure that were set up to safeguard a free and fair elections process but which were inefficient, compromised and politically skewed.

He said even with all of the manipulation of votes that took place, the PPP/C still managed to clinch over 49 per cent of the votes which means that it remains the single largest political organism in the country.

That aside, Jagdeo maintained that the 2015 elections experience has left a sour taste in the mouths of the PPP supporters and leaders because of the manner in which the elections was conducted by officials at GECOM.

Reforms

He said that the PPP had arrived at a plan of action to remedy some of the deficiencies encountered during the last elections.

Firstly, he made it clear that GECOM’s Chairman Dr Steve Surujbally has to go and the PPP/C is not willing to compromise on this aspect of the reforms it will pursue over the coming months.

“We believe that Surujbally does not have what it takes to deliver free and fair elections since the last elections…he has succumbed to pressure and has allowed himself to act in a partisan manner”, Jagdeo said firmly during the interview.

The former President said he found it unacceptable that Surujbally was making attempts to shift blame for the conduct of the elections to the Chief Elections Officer Keith Lowenfield following the PPP/C’s calls for him to resign.

Jagdeo insisted that “…he cannot put the blame on the CEO. He’s in charge”

Secondly, he said that the PPP/C was going to focus its efforts to advocating for a clean and sterilized Official List of Electors (OLE) with higher levels of accuracy. He argued that this was important as many of the concerns the party raised about the need to sanitize the voters list fell on deaf ears or were ignored by GECOM ahead of the May 11 elections.

GECOM Chairman Dr Steve Surujbally

He spoke about the need for GECOM to look closely at the appointment of Senior Staff including Presiding and Deputy Presiding Officers as some of them acted unlawfully during the last elections.

“We have to look at presiding officers because in the last elections you had presiding officers who were sympathetic to the opposition giving people extra ballots to vote”, Jagdeo alleged.

Introduction of Biometrics, electronic voting

Jagdeo, who is poised to become Guyana’s next Opposition Leader after he takes up his seat in Parliament, said that the PPP would push for the introduction of biometrics as part of the process of reforming the electoral process.

He believes that if you have enhanced biometrics outside of just a photo ID, then it would be difficult for the electoral process to be manipulated.

Jagdeo also disclosed that the party would be pushing for the introduction of electronic voting as well as a means of strengthening the system.

“You have a system that can do both. You can vote in the machine which has enhanced biometrics and it will issue a small paper which is a ballot which shows how you have voted…”, he suggested.

The Former President also called for an overhauling of the system and processes used to hire electoral staff and permanent workers for far flung areas arguing that the system needed to become more “fair”.

He made no bones about the need to cleanse of the system and the removal of all the political recruits.

He advised that already, steps are being made to lobby the international community for these reforms disclosing that the PPP wants to make the system at GECOM as fool proof as possible ahead of the next General and Regional elections or possible snap polls.

Denied recounts

Additionally, the former President also bemoaned the level of bias and lack of impartially that characterized GECOM’s system during the last elections as he referred to what obtained, for example, in the case of Region 8.

The PPP/C had lost that region by one vote as the APNU and AFC clinched onto the parliamentary seat for the Region.

“How could a request for a recount there be unreasonable…”, Jagdeo questioned before pointing out that even if GECOM wanted to deny requests for recounts elsewhere, the one for this region should have been accommodated given the number of spoilt votes there.

Probe of fake SOPs

Jagdeo said that he was appalled by the manner in which GECOM under Surujbally’s management handled the entire issues surrounding the discovery of fake and fraudulent Statement of Polls (SOPs).

“Fraudulent Statements of Polls means that someone put in place and gave GECOM fake statements of polls “, he started before stating, “What they should have done was to call in the police..It is a criminal offence to do this (produce fake SOPs)…Until now neither Surujbally nor Lowenfield have asked the Police to investigate how those fraudulent statements of polls got into GECOM”, the Guyanese leader said.

“…so they abdicated their responsibilities and I guess the reason why they never did that…were because they were afraid to find out the results of the investigations”, he maintained.

He said that he was “worried” about the police being asked to do it now because of the executive pressures on the Guyana Police Force and the development of worrying trend of undue political interference in its day to day management.

Had they done he investigation before, Jagdeo said that he suspected that a lot of people would be found guilty.

“We are not ruling out taking private criminal charges now since this is in vogue now against the people at GECOM”, he remarked.

Changing Commissioners, holding the fort

Jagdeo also announced that soon the Peoples Progressive Party Civic would move to change the three Commissioners that represent it at the level of GECOM.

He said that this was necessary given the party’s opposition status and there was a need for much more to be done to drive these reforms and ensure that all of GECOM’s failures are exposed and corrected.

He maintained that the PPP achieved the results as announced by GECOM in the most difficult socio-economic and political circumstances back in May.

“We were battling against time and there is a curiosity factor that said what if you had change?…battling a combined opposition…a significant part of the media that over the many years through a series of continuous assaults on the Govt and party created the impression that we were inefficient or corrupt…battling three years when every development of the Government were scrapped”, he contended before saying that “With all of these things stacked against us, we still managed to achieve over 49 per cent of the votes”.

He admitted that over the last two months, he has been talking to the party’s supporters and other stakeholders who have not fully recovered from GECOM’s announcement that the PPP lost the elections and its offensive post-elections posture.

“We have to hold together…it will be five years of difficult times for the country if the elections petition does not succeed….the country will have to go through a bit of trauma….I have this sense that our base is strong and waiting for our chance to go back in Government”.