HOPEWELL, Hanover – More than 50 placard-bearing women calling themselves members of the ‘Women on the Frontline Action Team’, yesterday staged a peaceful protest in Hopewell against the possible declaration tomorrow of the Eastern Hanover seat in favour of the People’s National Party’s (PNP) Dr D K Duncan.

“We are very dissatisfied with what is taking place. Mr (Barrigton) Gray, the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) candidate won the election on the third of September and should be our representative,” said Patsy Kerr, the president of the Eastern Hanover-based group.

Gray was declared winner of the closely contested seat in the final count by a margin of nine votes in the general elections held in September.

But Duncan filed a petition for a magisterial recount, citing a number of irregularities.

During the recount Duncan’s legal team, led by Abe Dabdoub, questioned the validity of a number of ballots and urged Resident Magistrate George Burton not to accept them, while Gray’s team submitted that those ballots in question should in fact be included in the count.

The ballots – which numbered about 60 – were torn and not signed by the presiding officers as the space provided for doing so was missing because the counterfoil on the ballots had not been properly torn by the presiding officers.

The resident magistrate subsequently ruled that the ballots would be excluded from the count, which led Gray’s attorney to file an application in the Supreme Court for a judicial review of the recount, but this was later denied by that court.

The JLP’s lawyers then went to the Court of Appeal to appeal the decision but it was last week dismissed by the court, paving the way for the resident magistrate to tally the votes and declare a winner. That is expected to be done tomorrow when the recount resumes.

Earlier this month, Duncan told the Observer that if the contentious ballots are not counted – based on his tally – he will be declared the winner of the seat by a majority of 10 votes.

But if the votes were to be counted Gray would retain the seat he had first won for the JLP in the 2002 general elections.

Yesterday, Kerr told the Observer that the decision of the resident magistrate not to admit the contentious ballots would disenfranchise voters in the constituency.

“Mr Gray has won the election and we want injustice to be rejected and not the people’s ballots, because they went out to vote and they voted for who they wanted to represent them,” she said.

“The persons who voted did not spoil their ballots; they were good votes,” added Kerr.

When asked what action the group will take if Duncan is installed as their MP, Kerr remarked, “When we reach that bridge we will cross it.”