APNU+AFC’s claims of ghost voting, impersonation was a fishing expedition – CARICOM team

The CARICOM high-level team which served as the scrutineer for the national vote recount has said the claims made by APNU+AFC of persons voting in the name of those who were either dead or out of the country on elections day was a fishing expedition.

“The Team viewed much of the exercise as a fishing expedition designed to gather data for a possible election petition and which resulted in considerable time being wasted during the recount,” the Team stated.

It added: “Further, the net was cast extremely wide in the hope of at least making a small catch and at times the anticipated harvest ended in slim pickings.”

The Team said, “the numerous requests for information on serial numbers were so bizarre, that on one observed occasion, an APNU+AFC agent was prepared to query serial numbers on the Official List of Elections in a Work Station where no one had voted.”

The Team said it did not view the objections raised by APNU+AFC as materially relevant to the recount of the ballot.

Moreover, we simply have no evidence as to who were the ultimate beneficiaries of the alleged “ghost voting” and voter impersonation.

But the Team noted that GECOM must deal expeditiously with claims of a padded voter’s list.

“As a minimum condition of electoral reform, the Team recommends the urgent need for a total re-registration of all voters in Guyana.

“It is clear that given the state of the voter registration of the country that Guyana was not adequately prepared for the 2020 poll.”

Incumbent President David Granger leads the APNU+AFC Coalition.