Speaking on the radio show ‘Straight Up’ hosted by Mark Benschop, Executive member and counting agent for the Coalition, Aubrey Norton said “only valid votes must be counted” based on the blatant acts of electoral fraud.
Norton mentioned over 40 boxes were found without statutory documents, meaning there was no way to verify if those ballots were legally cast. Additionally, he highlighted the votes cast by persons who were out of the jurisdiction on election day, dead persons who cast votes, persons voting without identifications, mission polling books, unstamped ballots among other fraudulent acts.
Norton mentioned that according to the law, the Chief Elections Officer will make a tabulation only on the valid votes.
“If you are saying by law that the CEO must make a declaration of the valid votes, one obviously has to conclude that the votes that are in the 45 ballot boxes with no documentation cannot be valid because they are in total violation of the law.”
According to Norton, the recount was a qualitative one that was held to determine the credibility of the elections. Therefore, he expects that the CEO in his report will reveal the clear pattern of electoral fraud.
“In this recount when you look at the APNU+AFC strongholds, all the documentation was there and you could have reconciled but it is interesting that in the PPP strongholds that there is this an absence of documentation. So, what has emerged is that a lot of the votes that PPP claimed to have had, are fraudulent.”
Further, he reminded that it was Anil Nandlall who initially said ‘one fraudulent act will nullify the entire process’ is now very quiet on the matter. He believes that the nullification of the elections is the solution.
“In my opinion, GECOM is within the confines of the law especially when one looks at the clause which states it must be valid votes and the gazetted order which says clearly that there must be a reconciliation and that the whole process must be aimed at determining whether the elections were credible or not. To that extent, I believe GECOM will be compelled, by law, to deal with these votes that are not valid. I believe nullification is the best route because you will never be able to quantify those qualitative things,” he added,” Norton said.
