Aubrey Norton received 1040 votes at PNC elections

…results for new CEC finally declared

People’s National Congress Reform (PNCR) Leader o Aubrey Norton was re-elected by just 1040 party members at last weekend’s Biennial Delegates Congress.
This is according to Vincent Alexander, the Returning Officer for the party’s internal elections.
It was previously reported that approximately 2000 party members were eligible to attend and vote at PNC’s congress. However, just under 1300 members voted during Sunday’s elections.
Norton had contested the PNC internal elections unopposed after his two competitors – Roysdale Forde, SC, and Amanza Walton-Desir – dropped out of the leadership race, citing concerns about the transparency of the party’s electoral process.
Moreover, Norton’s re-election to the helm of the PNC comes on the heels of him being embroiled in several in-house controversies resulting in the resignation of multiple senior party members with the most recent being the General Secretary, Dawn Hastings-Williams, who stepped down just days before the Congress over the lack of readiness for the event and concerns regarding financial accountability, among other reasons.

CEC Members
In addition to Norton, Shurwayne Holder was also re-elected Chairperson of the PNC while Elizabeth Williams-Niles and Vinceroy Jordan were elected as Vice Chairpersons and Elson Lowe as the Treasurer of the party.
While these results were released by the PNC the following day after the conclusion of its congress, the count of votes for the members of the party’s Central Executive Committee (CEC) were not completed until Thursday.

Defended delay
During a press conference on Friday, Alexander defended this delay, citing several factors including the fact that the counting process at this congress was centralised compared to the last elections when it was decentralised with counting in 11 districts hence the results at that time became available in just two days.
“On this occasion, the election was centralised and the counting took place, this time it took place in one place… The number of persons who voted this time were far more than the number of persons who voted on that occasion.
“The large number is not the long factor… The count actually took place three days and during those three days, we worked essentially in the evenings because those of us who were counting are otherwise occupied during the day… And there were less hands involved in [the counting at] this occasion,” the Returning Officer noted, adding that he did not “see the urgency” in employing more persons to fast-track the count.
While pointing out that the results for the main leadership positions were declared since the night of the election, Alexander argued that they were operating in accordance with the PNCR 2024 Internal Elections Procedures and Instructions, which provided for the announcement of results “not later than 24hrs after the count”. He contended that Friday’s announcement of the CEC results did not breach this regulation.
The members of the new PNC CEC are: Nima Flue-Bess, who received 835 votes; Mervyn Williams with 820 votes; Ganesh Mahipaul with 810 votes; Coretta McDonald with 808 votes; Robin Simon with 760 votes; Riaz Rupnarain with 750 votes; Anil Sugrim with 745 votes; Joan Ann Ramascindo with 740 votes; Sherwood Lowe with 726 votes; Troy Garraway with 722 votes; Kemel Kissoon with 702 votes; Marcia Gordon with 658 votes; Wainwright McIntosh also with 658 votes; Deron Adams with 626 votes and Jermaine Figueira, who secured 527 votes.

Concerns about transparency
In addition to the delay in the count, there had also been serious concerns over the transparency of the PNC elections.
This is not the first time the issue of electoral irregularities has risen at the PNC Congress. Similar allegations had also surfaced within the PNC when former leader David Granger was elected.
Meanwhile, People’s Progressive Party (PPP) General Secretary Bharrat Jagdeo on Thursday cast doubts on the election results of the PNCR, given the prolonged delay.
“It shows incompetence or either tampering of the ballots,” Jagdeo told reporters during a press conference.
On this note, Jagdeo compared the PNC’s inability to produce these results even after four days to his party’s ability to provide election results within a day after the PPP/Civic congress. He noted that the PNCR had approximately 1000 votes to select 60 candidates while the PPP/C had 2459 votes to determine 93 candidates at its congress held earlier this year.
“It’s either you’re doing something illegal or you’re unbelievably incompetent.”
He also spoke of the Opposition party’s Congress which was shrouded in claims of corruption from its own members. He added that while new leaders of that party will be tasked with proving that the party has changed, the internal elections again showed that this was not true.
“You have this opportunity to say now, that we’re going to change…But if your competitors are saying you rigged your own internal elections, how will people trust that you will stick to the democratic norm?” he questioned. (G8)