The Opposition parties contend that the proceedings are being used not simply to prosecute alleged electoral offences, but to publicly stigmatise political opponents, punish those associated with the former APNU+AFC administration and silence dissent through what they describe as a campaign of politically motivated vengeance.
The coalition maintains that the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) administration benefited from unexamined irregularities in its own strongholds, demands an even-handed accounting of the 2020 poll that scrutinises every party’s conduct, and affirms that those accused remain entitled to the presumption of innocence.
Six years after Guyana’s most bitterly contested electoral exercise, the political temperature surrounding its legal aftermath shows no sign of cooling.
The PNCR/APNU this week delivered its most forceful broadside yet against the criminal proceedings unfolding before the Georgetown Magistrates’ Court, denouncing what it describes as:
“naked political persecution being masqueraded as a criminal trial”
against former electoral officials and members of the opposition.
Nine Defendants, 19 Charges
Nine defendants, among them former GECOM Chief Elections Officer Keith Lowenfield, his former deputy Roxanne Myers, former Region Four Returning Officer Clairmont Mingo and former PNCR Chairperson Volda Lawrence, face 19 charges, including conspiracy to defraud and misconduct in public office, all arising from the chaotic tabulation of the March 2, 2020 poll.
The trial, which finally commenced on July 29, 2024 after four years of pre-trial limbo, has since wound through dozens of hearings, a change of magistrate, and repeated adjournments.
It is precisely this protracted meandering through the courts that the coalition seizes upon.
APNU contends that an administration:
“that owes its very existence to the most contested electoral process in our nation’s history”
is now hauling its political adversaries before the courts, in a matter that has lurched from adjournment to adjournment, hobbled by delays and procedural confusion of the state’s own making.
In the coalition’s blunt assessment:
“This is not justice. This is vengeance dressed in a robe.”
Questions of Selective Accountability
The accusation of selectivity forms the core of the coalition’s thesis.
Charges were laid swiftly once the PPP/C assumed office in August 2020, APNU notes, yet the case has scarcely advanced in years — evidence, the coalition argues, that conviction was never the true objective.
Rather, it contends, the prosecution’s real design was the headlines, the stigma, and the subduing of an opposition that refuses to submit.
The coalition’s challenge to the state is clear:
“if you have evidence, present it, test it in court, and let the law take its course. A charge is not a conviction, and a courtroom is not a campaign platform.”
APNU further insists that the PPP/C’s own hands are stained by the events of 2020.
While international attention fixed on the now-famous District Four drama, the coalition argues, irregularities in the PPP/C’s traditional strongholds — “the dead and migrated who somehow voted, the balloting that went unscrutinised” — remain uninvestigated and unanswered.
In the coalition’s cutting words:
“You cannot howl about electoral integrity while sitting atop a throne built on unanswered questions,”
adding:
“those who scream loudest about fraud are often those with the most to hide.”
The coalition demands that the state’s prosecutorial zeal be directed with equal ferocity toward every allegation arising from 2020, including those touching its own political opponents.
Anything less, it argues, forfeits the moral authority of the process:
“Justice that only ever travels in one direction is not justice; it is persecution.”
Presumption of Innocence
The coalition also invokes a principle it says the governing party’s supporters conveniently discarded once fortunes changed: the presumption of innocence.
It pledges solidarity with the accused, declaring:
“We will not be intimidated. We will not be silenced,”
until the Guyanese people are afforded what it calls:
“a genuinely independent, even-handed accounting of 2020, one that examines every party’s conduct.”
What Happened in 2020?
For context, the 2020 poll plunged Guyana into months of institutional and political uncertainty.
A national recount supervised by GECOM produced totals of 233,336 votes for the PPP/C and 217,920 for APNU+AFC.
The PPP/C was subsequently declared the winner and President Irfaan Ali was sworn into office on August 2, 2020.
The legal and political disputes surrounding the election continued, eventually leading to a Presidential Commission of Inquiry.
The Commission later concluded that former Chief Elections Officer Keith Lowenfield, former Deputy Chief Elections Officer Roxanne Myers and former Region Four Returning Officer Clairmont Mingo had made what it described as “shockingly brazen attempts” to derail and corrupt the prescribed electoral process and to undermine the true declaration of the results.
The defendants have pleaded not guilty.
The current trial continues to examine the evidence surrounding the tabulation and declaration of the 2020 results. On September 18, 2026, forensic auditor Terrence Jaskaran testified about discrepancies between certified Statements of Poll and Form 24 declarations in Region Four.
His evidence included a 20,243-vote difference between his tabulation of certified Statements of Poll for APNU+AFC and the March 5 Form 24 declaration. Defence attorneys challenged his qualifications and experience in electoral auditing, although the court accepted him as an expert in forensic auditing.
The coalition’s closing plea is directed at the national conscience:
“Our democracy deserves the truth, the whole truth, not the PPP/C’s selective, weaponised version of it.”
