Whenever GECOM gets its act together and the recount of the votes from the March 2nd general elections begins at the Arthur Chung Conference Centre (ACCC) it should be clear to all that there will be riggers present hoping to continue their mission for the illegal installation of an APNU+AFC government.
Let there be no doubt that the two fictitious declarations for District Four using fantasy spreadsheets and everything that followed since, including the presentation of a final report to GECOM for approval, signal that the riggers and plotters have gone too far to turn back now and that the ACCC will be the venue of the final concerted push to overturn the democratic will of the people.
It means that all those forces who have come out in support of democracy and free and fair elections must redouble their efforts to ensure that that this abominable, slow-motion rigging of Guyana’s elections is repulsed and the guilty are identified and prosecuted.
By virtue of her one-sided and indefensible votes on Friday to a series of motions presented by opposition-appointed commissioners, GECOM Chair Justice (Ret’d) Claudette Singh has made it clear that she is fully in charge of decisions in the recount process. All eyes will now be on her to ensure rigorous management of the process so that there is no upheaval and that the recount gives Guyana a final result as soon as possible considering that eight weeks have now elapsed since Guyanese cast their ballots. That a result is not yet available is fully and solely attributable to Justice Singh and were the recount not to proceed in a smooth manner, her actions or lack thereof will be forever etched in Guyana’s hall of electoral infamy.
So what would be the plan of the riggers and their accomplices? The first tool is delay, delay, delay and then obfuscate and be obtuse to the nth degree. It has already been well-deployed in the planning for the recount and Ms Singh will have to show an awareness of this and ruthlessly cut it off.
The second tool, and this will be the plan of last resort, will be to create maximum administrative confusion and controversies once the recount gets underway. Every untidily packed ballot box, ink stain, differently folded ballot paper or missing stamp pad will potentially be used to create loud and disruptive argumentation. The District Four ballots will be the key point for the objections but the intention will be to create doubts about all regions and especially since four of them are apparently to be counted simultaneously.
It is at this point that it is germane to recognise again the patriotic and heroic performance of 2300+ teams of Guyanese of all political and racial stripes and economic backgrounds who counted the votes of the people at each ballot station on the night of March 2nd and posted up the official results of the poll. In the presence of APNU+AFC and PPP/C agents the polling station teams counted votes, settled disputes over spoilt ballots, entered tallies and filled in Statements of Poll (SoPs) with nary a controversy. They then all signed off on the SoPs. Considering that both APNU+AFC and PPP/C agents were present during these counts, there should be nothing in the recount that produces any cause for disputation.
There will be some distance between the 10 work stations at the planned ACCC recount which will make it easier to apprehend, contain and rapidly settle any disagreements peaceably. However, there is also the possibility that with ease of communication that 10 eruptions can occur all at the same time upon signal to undermine the process. Does Ms Singh have an awareness of how malevolent the disruption plans can be and what will be required to maintain order and the integrity of the process? It would not be difficult to envisage boisterous disagreements erupting along with physical altercations and the endangering of the materiel in the ballot boxes.
How will order be maintained? Ms Singh and her Commission are yet to address the public on this. However, if the plan is to employ certain ranks of the Guyana Police Force (GPF) to try to maintain order then the people should be worried. The police have operated as enforcers on behalf of the plotters as evidenced by their crude behaviour when party agents were evicted from the Ashmins building on March 5th, the sidelining of a senior policeman who declined to evict a GECOM commissioner from said building and the chasing away of party agents from the ACCC compound prior to the aborted recount of votes. Ms Singh should make it clear to Police Commissioner Leslie James that this type of conduct would not be tolerated and perhaps a private security service can also assist GECOM. Whatever decision is finally made, where disruptive behaviour occurs those engaged in such will have to be immediately expelled from the process and replaced if possible.
Hopefully arrangements will be rapidly concluded for observers from the local groups that participated along with those from CARICOM, the EU, the Carter Center, the Commonwealth and the OAS to fully oversee the process. As we have said before, whether Guyana is described as a democracy or a state with an illegal government rests largely in the hands of GECOM Chair Justice Singh. In 2001, Justice Singh vitiated the results of the 1997 general elections citing an unconstitutional voter ID requirement which had been agreed to by both the PPP/C and the PNC. Ms Singh must take due care to ensure she doesn’t compromise these elections by delinquency or by turning a blind eye to the riggers.
