The Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) will not continue with house-to-house registration until late October as was initially published in the Official Gazette. Instead, the exercise will come to end on Saturday, August 31.
This is based on the instruction of GECOM Chairperson, Justice Claudette Singh.
Moments ago, GECOM issued a release acknowledging that the no-confidence motion passed in the National Assembly on December 21, 2018 triggered a number of legal challenges in the local courts and concluded with a ruling by the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ).
GECOM said that cognizant of all that has transpired over the past months, it has an obligation to produce a credible Official List of Electors (OLE) in the first instance and ultimately credible elections within the shortest possible time.
The release further read, “After considerable deliberations at the Commission on the way forward regarding the conduct of General and Regional Elections, Chairperson of the Guyana Elections Commission, Justice Claudette Singh, S.C., C.C.H at the Statutory Meeting of the Commission held on 27th August, 2019 has instructed the following:
“1. House to House Registration must be brought to an end. As such, Order 25 of 2019 published in the Official Gazette should be amended for the exercise to conclude on 31st August, 2019 instead of 20th October, 2019.
2. Based on the ruling of the Chief Justice on 14th August, 2019 that House to House Registration is not unlawful and is constitutional, the data garnered from that registration exercise must be merged with the existing National Register of Registrants Database (NRRDB).
3. In this regard, the Commission will move to ensure all arrangements for the publication of a credible Preliminary List of Electors (PLE) before commencement of an extensive Claims and Objections (C&O) exercise.”
GECOM said that it will continue to further deliberate on other matters of importance for the holding of General and Regional Elections within the shortest possible time and the Secretariat will continue to implement a number of operations activities, in particular, the training of polling day staff and procurement of non-sensitive materials.
A previous version of this story had said, “In this regard, the Commission will move to an extensive Claims and Objections Exercise (C&O) before extracting the Preliminary List of Electors (PLE).” GECOM has since issued a correction and this updated information has been reflected in the story above.
