Granger’s statements on Lowenfield, CARICOM’s report are “downright misleading” Jagdeo
Leader of the People’s Progressive Party/ Civic (PPP/C), Bharrat Jagdeo has denounced the recent statements issued by de facto President David Granger regarding the country’s electoral impasse and its slow progress. During a virtual press conference conducted yesterday, Jagdeo labelled Granger’s utterances as “actually wrong and in many cases, downright misleading”. Monday evening, Granger was the guest on a radio programme hosted by Mark Benschop where he stated that he was in full support of the report submitted by the Chief Elections Officer (CEO), Keith Lowenfield, in which 115,844 votes were discarded due to “anomalies and irregularities” in the March 2 electoral process. The President further stated that the Commission, headed by Chair of the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM),
Justice (ret’d) Claudette Singh, was bound to make a final declaration on Lowenfield’s ‘fraudulent report’—as Jagdeo labelled it.
It was during his press conference that the Opposition Leader was keen to highlight that the President neglected to acknowledge the key bodies that have made efforts to derail, discredit and prolong the March 2020 election proceedings. To give credit to his statements, Jagdeo referenced Region Four Returning Officer (RO) Clairmont Mingo; the Chief Elections Officer (CEO), Keith Lowenfield, and others as the stakeholders in the A Partnership for National Unity + Alliance For Change (APNU+AFC), as those responsible for the delay. In sharing his concerns, Jagdeo explained, “Mr. Granger never for a moment acknowledged what the country knows—that Mingo was the primary source of the fraud that led to the delay in the declaration of results, and that has been proven. We have declarations by Mr. Mingo at odds with the Region Four document that was certified after the recount, and in those two documents, it has been demonstrated factually, mathematically, that Mingo inflated the figures in APNU’s favour by over 19,000 votes, and reduced another 3,000 for the People’s Progressive Party/ Civic.”
During Benschop’s interview, President Granger emphasized that the Elections Commission is “bound” to accept the report of the CEO, although Lowenfield, a statutory officer, discarded 115,844 votes in his most recent report.
(Kaieteur News)