Ramjattan cites privacy on question of releasing APNU/AFC SoPs

− confirms party will not be releasing proof of alleged victory

Amid all the controversies surrounding Guyana’s election and the subsequent recount, a frequent question has been why A Partnership for National Unity/Alliance For Change (APNU/AFC) is so reluctant to produce their Statements of Poll (SoPs), documents which would vindicate their claims of winning the election.

When asked about this recently, AFC leader and Prime Ministerial hopeful Khemraj Ramjattan made it clear that the coalition will not release its SoPs, claiming it is a question of “privacy”.
“We have offered an explanation; I think why not? We will wait until we have to go for an elections petition or some such thing afterwards. That is the explanation given. And that is exclusively the privacy of the coalition party.”
“I can understand you’re [asking] why not? Well, that is our position. We would like to see what GECOM and the boxes are showing, so we can make our contrast, so we will be in a better position to make an assessment of the overall nature of what transpired.”
Meanwhile, the issue was again raised by People’s Progressive Party (PPP) Executive Anil Nandlall in an interview with the media on Saturday. Nandlall, whose party has already released almost 900 of its own SoPs, questioned the coalition’s reluctance to prove the victory it claims.
“Unless the ballots magically transform themselves, the PPP has won these elections. The Statements of Poll that GECOM gave us on election day establishes that without a doubt, by over 15,000. So, I can safely say that unless something magically happens and votes disappear, the PPP has won the elections. APNU knows that. [Chief Elections Officer] Keith Lowenfield knows that. GECOM knows that – they have the evidence. Why you think they’re not making it public?”

“APNU, these people that are so hungry for political power, you think they would win an election and not show their Statements of Poll? Look at the ridiculous lie they’ve been peddling every day. All they need to do is say, this is our Statements of Poll. But they cannot do that. Because they have lost the elections,” Nandlall said.
The recount has not even reached the halfway stage, but stakeholders are contending that the numbers the exercise is producing are exposing the declarations made by Region Four Returning Officer Clairmont Mingo as bogus and inflated in favour of the incumbent political party.
In an interview with the media after day four of Saturday’s recount came to a two-hour premature end, Guyana Elections Commissioner Sase Gunraj explained that a comparison between GECOM’s official SoPs for a Polling Station on the East Bank of Demerara and the Statement of Recount match perfectly. Unfortunately, it does not match what Mingo declared.
In a graphic comparison of six SoPs it had released, the recount figures and the ones declared by Mingo, the PPP had claimed on Friday that there was consistent inflation of the votes for APNU/AFC.
In the case of box number 4013, the figures PPP released had shown that both the recount figures and the SoP have listed APNU as securing 188 votes. In Mingo’s declaration, however, APNU was given 247 votes, an increase of 59.
In box number 4014, the PPP had shown that while APNU was listed as securing 160 votes by both the SOP and the recount, Mingo had declared them as receiving 215 votes – an increase of 55.
The most graphic increase was in box number 4020, where the SoP and Statement of Recount had APNU as securing 187 votes. Mingo declared them to have received 287 votes, an inflation of 100 votes.