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.