Lowenfield holding Guyana at ransom

Chief Elections Officer (CEO) Keith Lowenfield has refused to submit a report on the results of the recount for declaration by the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM), despite receiving clear instructions to do so from the Chair, Justice (ret’d) Claudette Singh.

Kaieteur News was informed by opposition- nominated commissioner Bibi Shadick, that Lowenfield told the Chair that he had not presented the report at 1PM yesterday, the deadline, because he had received notice of a filing in the Court of Appeal, which was meant to block his submission.

Lowenfield reportedly gave this excuse, even though the filing does not prevent him from handing in the report. He then, according to Shadick, said that he would show up at 2PM yesterday, but when that hour came, Lowenfield was nowhere to be found.

However, some argue that there is much hypocrisy in Lowenfield’s reluctance to submit his final report after bearing in mind that he had previously submitted a report to the Commission, despite an injunction filed against him by the People’s Progressive Party/ Civic (PPP/C).

On March 7, two days after Region Four Returning Officer (RO) Clairmont Mingo had declared fraudulent elections results, Lowenfield prepared his final report on the March 2 General and Regional Elections and had called for a meeting of the Elections Commission to approve it even though, there was an injunction filed by the opposition, barring them from declaring the election results.

At the time his report had contained unverified votes in Region Four, the most decisive and contentious district.
Upon seeing an invitation to attend Lowenfield’s meeting, the three opposition- nominated commissioners said in a statement, “We consider this invitation to meet as a flagrant attempt to breach the Order of Court aforesaid and a naked attempt by the Chief Elections Officer, Keith Lowenfield, to suborn us to breach an Order of Court and exposing us to liability for contempt of Court.”

On the other hand, there were not enough government-nominated commissioners at GECOM yesterday for a quorum, as Charles Corbin and Desmond Trotman were absent. The lone government- nominated commissioner, Vincent Alexander, could not inform the media for the reasons why his colleagues were absent, but added that they justified their absence with the GECOM Chair, and not with him.

Hence, Justice Singh made a decision to postpone the meeting to today at 1PM, as no decisions could be made in the absence of a quorum. However, late yesterday afternoon, Public Relations Officer (PRO) Yolanda Ward informed the press that that set meeting would no longer be held, as the Notice of Appeal for the matter Lowenfield referred to is set for a hearing at 01:30 pm.

Despite there being no legal obstacle to GECOM receiving its report and making a declaration, GECOM has provided no timeline for the conclusion of the electoral process.