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Tuesday, July 29, 2025

Wrong party symbol placed on ballot papers

by

Sascha Wilson
1819 days ago
20200804
Nikoli Edwards leader of the Progressive Party (PP) and candidate for San Fernando West speaks with a resident along the Train Line in Marabella on Sunday. 

Nikoli Edwards leader of the Progressive Party (PP) and candidate for San Fernando West speaks with a resident along the Train Line in Marabella on Sunday. 

INNIS FRANCIS

Sascha Wil­son

With the elec­tions mere days away, one po­lit­i­cal par­ty is con­cerned that the Elec­tions and Bound­aries Com­mis­sion (EBC) has put its lone can­di­date at a dis­ad­van­tage by mis­rep­re­sent­ing its sym­bol on the bal­lot pa­per.

Pro­gres­sive Par­ty leader Nikoli Ed­wards who is con­test­ing the San Fer­nan­do West seat has writ­ten to the EBC ex­press­ing his con­cern over this de­vel­op­ment.

In re­sponse, how­ev­er, the EBC stat­ed that the onus is al­so on the can­di­date to en­sure that its po­lit­i­cal sym­bol is cor­rect and he failed to ob­ject to the sym­bol when he filed by nom­i­na­tion pa­pers.

In a press re­lease, the par­ty stat­ed, “The Elec­tions and Bound­aries Com­mis­sion (EBC) has failed to prop­er­ly rep­re­sent the Pro­gres­sive Par­ty’s (Pro­gres­sives) sym­bol on the bal­lot in the 2020 Gen­er­al Elec­tion. The sym­bol ap­proved by the Pro­gres­sives and the EBC back in 2017 was not what was placed on the bal­lot and to date, the EBC has of­fered no ex­pla­na­tion for this.”

The par­ty felt the omis­sion of the name of the par­ty next to the sym­bol could con­fuse elec­tors.

“Through­out the cam­paign, the par­ty has been us­ing its com­plete sym­bol and ad­vised its sup­port­ers to look for that on the bal­lot pa­per. This lat­est er­ror by the EBC has the po­ten­tial to con­fuse elec­tors and thus the par­ty has writ­ten to the EBC seek­ing clar­i­ty and a way for­ward.”

In an in­ter­view with Guardian Me­dia, Ed­wards said he has re­ceived all kinds of no­tices and let­ters from the EBC, but no re­sponse to their con­cerns over the mis­rep­re­sen­ta­tion of their sym­bol on the bal­lot pa­per. “They have not even ac­knowl­edged it,” he said.

Apart from his name, he said elec­tors will be ex­pect­ing to see the name of the par­ty next to the sym­bol just like the oth­er par­ties. While he did not ex­pect the EBC to reprint thou­sands of bal­lots for San Fer­nan­do West, Ed­wards said it is on­ly fair that they put out an of­fi­cial no­tice ac­knowl­edg­ing that they erred. Al­so, on elec­tion day, the polling clerk ad­vis­es the elec­tors about the er­ror so that they would not be con­fused. How­ev­er, in re­sponse to the Ed­wards press re­lease, the EBC stat­ed that Ed­wards failed to of­fi­cial­ly in­form the EBC that there was an anom­aly in the rep­re­sen­ta­tion of his po­lit­i­cal par­ty’s sym­bol when he filed his Nom­i­na­tion Pa­pers.

“On both Ju­ly 10 and Ju­ly 17, for the Pre-ex­am­i­na­tion of nom­i­na­tion pa­pers and Nom­i­na­tion Day at the Of­fice of the Re­turn­ing Of­fi­cer, Mr. Ed­wards was shown the sym­bol for his po­lit­i­cal par­ty that would be re­pro­duced on the bal­lot pa­per for the elec­toral dis­trict he is con­test­ing at the Au­gust 10, 2020 polls. Mr. Ed­wards raised no ob­jec­tion.”

The EBC ad­vised that whilst it is the re­spon­si­bil­i­ty of the Gov­ern­ment Print­er to use the gazetted po­lit­i­cal sym­bols on the bal­lot pa­pers, it is the re­spon­si­bil­i­ty of the can­di­date to en­sure that their po­lit­i­cal sym­bol is cor­rect in the process. The EBC al­so ex­pressed con­fi­dence that on elec­tion day there will be no con­fu­sion as Ed­ward’s par­ty is con­test­ing one seat and the sym­bol there­fore on­ly ap­pears on the bal­lot pa­pers for the elec­toral dis­trict of San Fer­nan­do West. Nine­teen po­lit­i­cal par­ties have en­tered the elec­tion race with a to­tal of 150 can­di­dates vy­ing for seats in 41 con­stituen­cies in T&T.


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