Back to square one

by Ken Quintanilla

Guam - It's back to the original plan for the Guam Election Commission to complete the handcount of all five precincts previously agreed upon as part of the ongoing audit of the 2010 general election. "Frankly, we've been waiting to look at these ballots, to have our day in court for two years and we've been blocked since the day of the election. Thsathis is our chance to take a look at what might have happened."

During the GEC's regular meeting Tuesday, commissioner Chris Carillo moved to undo the action taken by the GEC last week and go back to handcounting of all five precincts agreed upon earlier this month. "I feel like you've taken that away from not only the Democratic Party but from the people of Guam to trust us to run a free and fair election," he explained.

Independent member Patrick Civille made the motion last week to cut the audit short by handcounting just Precinct 15b due to the time constraints and little to no difference in results.  "It is a tremendous burden on Maria [Pangelinan] and the GEC staff but what we did last week reach this agreement because it appeared that we were spinning our wheels and it wasn't going to be productive," he said.

Should there be a 10% variance in results, they would continue with the other precincts but if not, the audit would be done. "We did one random one and it took a week and we said this is taking too long, and now we're looking for a number - 10% variance? I mean, that I feel that it's not good for the people of Guam, it's definitely not good for the Democrats," he said.

Civille then had a change of heart, saying he understood the importance the audit was to the Democrat Party and keeping the bi-partisan agreement made a few weeks ago. "And I blame the Legislature, they could have written a simple law, a clearer law, if they wanted a recount, they could have used that word, it's a term they're well familiar with," he said.

The motion passed to reinstate the original audit with the two republican members voting against. Pangelinan, the GEC's executive director, meanwhile says it may be taking staff away from other work, but they'll make due. "So what it is though is the commission represents the people out there and if they come to the decision based on all the information in front of them, I trust they've come to the best decision and they did," she said.

The Guam Election will continue the handcount of Precinct 15b followed by Precinct 14 in Mongmong-Toto-Maite, Precinct 15c in Barrigada, and Precinct 19b in Yigo.