BUFF BAY, Portland – The full force of the two major political parties descended on the constituency of Portland West yesterday for the nominations of Daryl Vaz and Kenneth Rowe for the March 23 by-election, which became necessary after the courts determined that the September 2007 general election in the constituency was null and void.

Prime Minister Bruce Golding and Opposition Leader Portia Simpson Miller led the parties’ charge into the constituency and the Jamaica Labour Party’s (JLP’s) Vaz was the first of three candidates to be nominated, followed by the People’s National Party’s (PNP’s) Rowe, and Ras Astor Black of the Jamaica Alliance Movement.

At 11:10 am, Vaz and his wife Ann-Marie, accompanied by Golding, deputy leader James Robertson, general secretary Karl Samuda, campaign manager Robert Montague, other JLP parliamentarians and a large crowd of supporters, arrived at the nomination centre at the Buff Bay community hospital compound.

In less than three minutes, Vaz’s documents were verified by Returning Officer Carlton Harris and he was out of the centre.

Vaz, who says he will not be celebrating a victory if he does not win by 2,000 or more votes, was not as sanguine, though he expects to win.

“I am just going to continue the work that I started,” Vaz said immediately after he left the nomination centre. “I have a number of projects that are still ongoing. I have a lot to prepare for my new CDF (Constituency Development Fund) which are still ongoing and I am keeping focus. I am not letting the campaign distract the work of the people, although we have to do a certain amount of campaigning. This election is performance over loyalty.”

Montague said the strategy will be the same as in 2007.

“If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” he said. “We are going to knock on every door, we going down every street, we going to walk up every mountain, every gully bank, anywhere the people are, we will be there.”

Following Vaz’s nomination, party officials left the area for a motorcade through several communities in the constituency. The route took them through a large crowd of PNP supporters that had started gathering for Rowe’s scheduled 1:00 pm nomination.

At 12:50 pm, Rowe, accompanied by Simpson Miller, former PNP vice president Dr Peter Phillips, general secretary Peter Bunting, chairman Robert Pickersgill, vice president Angela Brown-Burke, and a heavy crowd of PNP supporters, arrived at the nomination centre.

His nomination was delayed for nearly half-an-hour because his vetted nomination documents were not presented on arrival, as required.

Returning Officer Carlton Harris explained that the documents should have been presented for ease of nomination. Simpson Miller explained that different individuals were assigned specific roles, and it was not Rowe’s duty to present the forms.

“The form was not missing, it was presented. They had the nomination papers and you saw it,” she said.

Speaking to Rowe’s chances of winning, the PNP president said: “We are very confident that all who said that argument done, on the 23rd the argument will be finished. We are all going to be working. We have the top leadership of the party here to ensure that we take home West Portland for the PNP. We are not here for joke. We are not treating it as a walkover, we are treating it as a constituency and an election that we want to win and we must win.”

Meanwhile Black, who has sought elected office in different elections in the past, said he wants the corruption in Jamaican politics to stop.

“I am never frustrated in the process,” he said. “This is fun, and everyday I will be there to represent the people.”

The three candidates were given copies of the voters list to be used in the by-election.

PNP officials then left for a motorcade in the constituency, and the day’s proceedings were scheduled to culminate in a mass rally in Buff Bay last night.

Rowe, who contested the 2002 general elections on a JLP ticket but lost by 281 votes to the PNP’s Errol Ennis, said the awesomeness of the PNP will overcome.

“They are running scared,” he said of the JLP. “Let me tell you, today is the beginning of the end of the broken vase. On the 23rd of March, Kenneth Rowe will be the member of parliament.”

In the streets, vehicular indiscipline reigned and the security forces were busy trying to regulate traffic. Despite the police’s presence, body protrusion from vehicles was the order of the day. Luckily, no one was hurt.

After some time, the police, apparently frustrated by their inability to control the disorder, turned a blind eye to the breaches.

The by-election was ordered by the Supreme Court and the decision upheld by the Appeal Court after Vaz was disqualified for being a citizen of the United States of America when he won the seat in the 2007 general elections.

The PNP’s Abe Dabdoub had taken the matter to court and asked that Vaz be disqualified and that he (Dabdoub) be installed as MP.