GECOM requirement for every person to verify they exist is the ‘perfectly correct thing to do’ – Ramjattan

Leader of the Alliance for Change (AFC) Khemraj Ramjattan is in full support of the requirement set out by the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) for hundreds of thousands of persons to visit GECOM’s offices with their ID cards to verify their information.

“I don’t not see anything wrong with that. That is the perfectly correct thing to do and we must adhere to the rulings of the GECOM,” Ramjattan said on the issue when questioned by reporters on the sidelines of an event Monday morning.

“You do not want ghosts on the list, and the best way of verifying the list… is what she (Chairman of GECOM) ruled – go to the registration centres and show your ID cards.

“I think it is in accordance with law of Guyana…,” Ramjtattan stated.

“You know, the constitutional agency GECOM has as its head a very, very senior judicial luminary in Claudette Singh…,” he added.

GECOM had abandoned its house to house registration exercise and is set to begin a Claims and Objections period on October 1. With the new requirement, it means GECOM is trying to get 646, 625 persons to visit its offices over a 49-day period.

The last electoral list, used for Local Government elections in November 2018, had a total of 573, 923 names; the new list was prepared after cross-checking from the recent house to house registration exercise was completed.

Usually, the Claims and Objections period is used to allow persons not yet registered to do so and for persons already on the list to make any changes to their information, such as if they have changed their name or address. In addition, Claims and Objections allows for the names of dead persons to be removed.

But GECOM has announced that every person whose name appears on the Preliminary List of Electors (PLE) must verify their registration record.

GECOM said in its statement “every person whose name appear on the Preliminary List of Electors (PLE) must visit the Registration office in their respective area with their National Identification Card to verify their registration record in order to be included in the Official List of Electors (OLE).”

“What’s wrong with that?” asked Ramjattan.

“You have to get some method by which you will verify that you are existing.”

The Opposition PPP has denounced the latest moved by GECOM and its three Commissioners are expected to raise the issue at Tuesday’s statutory meeting of the Commission.