After an entire morning of recounting ballots cast in Sub-District Four (East Coast Demerara) of Region 4, there has been no significant changes in the numbers.
This is according to Government-nominated GECOM Commissioner Sase Gunraj, who told the News Room moments ago that, “After an entire morning of counting at the request of APNU, nothing has changed significantly, except the frustration of this nation.
“This is a wanton waste of time.”
The September 1 general and regional elections have been hailed as efficiently conducted but a request for a recount by A Partnership for National Unity (APNU) of this specific subdistrict has further delayed the official declaration of the results by the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM).
Gunraj believes that efforts now to stall the final declaration by way of a recount are only delaying that inevitable re-election of the People’s Progressive Party Civic (PPP/C).
Earlier on Thursday, Gunraj engaged reporters outside GECOM in Georgetown, where he noted that APNU was within its rights to request this recount, but opined that such a move is only delaying the declaration of the results.
In fact, he opined that APNU is in disbelief at its performance.
“The dissatisfaction, if I can hazard a guess, is not really with the process or the numbers. They are dissatisfied with their performance, and there is an attempt to translate it to the process.”
The recount got underway at 08:00 hrs, and there are 25 workstations in use; the recount exercise will proceed uninterrupted until completion.
Based on the results declared by the region’s Returning Officer and seen by the News Room, the PPP/C got 87,536 votes in the general election.
Surprisingly, the PNC-led APNU got 46,956 votes in the region. This region was never lost by the PNC, which morphed into APNU in 2011, since Guyana gained independence in 1966.
In 2020, APNU got 116,941 votes in the region while the PPP got 80,920.
Meanwhile, the third-highest number of votes went to the newly formed We Invest in Nationhood (WIN) party; that party got 41,607 votes in the region.
The PPP/C increased its votes in this region by 6,616, but APNU’s 2020 lead was taken away following the emergence of WIN and the support that party garnered.
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