Gail Alexan­der

The Op­po­si­tion UNC has so far lost re­counts in three out of six elec­toral ar­eas and was await­ing re­sults for San­gre Grande north­west last night.

Elec­tions and Bound­aries Com­mis­sion chief elec­tion of­fi­cer, Ramesh Nanan, said fol­low­ing Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment elec­tions, re­counts were sought, main­ly by UNC and one by the PNM.

The UNC had sought re­counts in seats in San Juan/Laven­tille, Tu­na­puna/Pi­ar­co, Ma­yaro/Rio Claro, Princes Town and San­gre Grande.

The PNM sought a re­count in the Princes Town Cor­po­ra­tion seat of Hin­dus­tan/St Mary's seat which the UNC had won. That was aban­doned, the Guardian learned.

Up to yes­ter­day, how­ev­er, UNC had lost the re­counts in Ma­yaro/Rio Claro, San Juan/Laven­tille and Princes Town.

UNC Sen­a­tor, Ger­ald Ramdeen. rep­re­sent­ing the par­ty at the San­gre Grande re­count, said UNC had ini­tial­ly sought re­count for two San­gre Grande seats – north­west and north.

But he said when the fi­nal fig­ures were ob­tained, the mar­gin of vic­to­ry for the PNM in San­gre Grande north east was too large– about 300 votes–and the UNC did not pur­sue that re­count.

Up to 6 pm yes­ter­day, re­count for the San­gre Grande north­west seat was still in progress with two more box­es to be count­ed.

PNM deputy leader, Ro­han Sinanan, op­ti­mistic the PNM would re­tain the seat, not­ed: "The PNM did bet­ter in San­gre Grande on Mon­day than we did in 2013. We made in­roads in­to UNC ar­eas and where we lost to UNC – such as Man­zanil­la – it was by small num­bers. So we are clos­ing the gap.

"I can­not see how the UNC can claim any 'vic­to­ry.' We had eight cor­po­ra­tions, we have got­ten back eight (with Grande). We had 83 seats in 2013 and lost one now."

The UNC, which sought re­count in the Ma­yaro/Rio Claro seat of Co­cal Mafek­ing, lost.

The re­sults re­mained the same as be­fore, UNC Ma­yaro MP Rush­ton Paray con­firmed.

UNC Sen­a­tor Wade Mark, who mon­i­tored the re­count in the San Juan/Laven­tille seat of Barataria, said the UNC lost.

"The PNM won the seat since the re­count showed we got the same num­ber which came in on Mon­day. We lost by just over 300 votes," Mark added.

A re­count in Cau­ra/Par­adise/Tacarigua (Tu­na­puna- Pi­ar­co), which be­gan at 10 am, was con­tin­u­ing yes­ter­day. By 3.15 pm, on­ly six of 21 box­es had been checked, the UNC stat­ed. PNM of­fi­cials ex­pect­ed to hold the seat since the PNM won by 309 votes.

RE­SULTS RE­MAIN THE SAME IN PRINCES TOWN

The UNC had al­so sought a re­count in one Princes Town seat and the PNM had sought a re­count in an­oth­er.

UNC Princes Town MP Bar­ry Padarath said the UNC had sought re­count in the Lengua/In­di­an Walk seat which the PNM won.

But Padarath said the re­count re­sults were the same and the PNM won the seat by over 100 votes.

On the PNM's re­quest­ed re­count in Hin­dus­tan/St Mary's (which the UNC won), Padarath said the PNM called off the re­count when the fifth of 16 box­es was opened. UNC re­tained that seat.

Con­se­quent­ly, Padarath said, Mon­day's re­sults in the Princes Town Cor­po­ra­tion re­mains the same: Nine seats for UN, one for the PNM,"

"We have not­ed PNM Moru­ga MP Dr Lovell Fran­cis' lament that many in his con­stituen­cy re­turned to the UNC. "We al­so no­ticed many switched from the PNM to the UNC. If you ex­am­ine re­sults by polling di­vi­sions, you see where PN­Mites went to the UNC. So be­tween now and gen­er­al elec­tion we'll be work­ing Moru­ga to re­gain it in next gen­er­al elec­tion," he added.

Padarath said high vot­er turnout had been ob­served among sup­port­ers in its strong­holds "and less of a turnout in PNM ar­eas but we gained 12 ad­di­tion­al seats in Ch­agua­nas, Tu­na­puna, Princes Town, Ma­yaro and San­gre Grande."