SOUTHFIELD, St Elizabeth — The Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) candidate to replace Shirley Myers– the sitting councillor in South East St Elizabeth’s Southfield division– in the upcoming local government polls will be decided on February 21.

Just under 200 delegates in the division are eligible to cast their ballots between 12 noon and 5:00 pm at the specially called delegates’ conference to be held at the Top Hill Primary School in the division.

The aspirants are businesswoman Sophia Francis; farmer Eli Gayle and Myers’ son Gregory, a guidance councillor at the Ballards Valley Primary School in St Elizabeth.

Political observers in the area say the race to succeed Myers should be a close fight between Gregory and Francis.

Meanwhile, both Gregory and Francis say they have already commenced campaigning activities in the division.

“My campaign was started in the Queensbury area last week Monday night and I will be going house to house in the coming days to meet with all the delegates in the division,” said Francis, who has assembled a formidable campaign committee.

The team, Francis said, includes Miguel Smith, the former campaign manager for Frank Witter, the member of parliament for South East St Elizabeth, as well as Kingsley Ebanks who also assisted Witter in his successful campaign bid to represent the constituency in the 2007 general elections.

Francis added that she has also organised several cricket matches in the area, as part of her campaign activities.

Beaming with confidence, she told the Observer West that she is hopeful that the campaign will be clean and there will be no attempts to smear anyone.

In the meantime, the elder Myers, who has been appointed as his son’s campaign manager, said his campaign activities officially began last week Tuesday in the Queensbury and Rose Hall areas.

“Being the councillor for almost 25 years, the delegates and I have a very good relationship so I believe that they will support my son,” he said.

But in spite of that, he pointed out that he is not taking anything for granted.

“Although I am very confident that he (Gregory ) will win, I am not taking any chances, so we will be campaigning vigorously because in politics anything can happen,” he explained.

In the meantime, the 36-year-old Gayle, who says that he has been involved in political activities for more than two decades will kick off his campaign by going to church.

“We are looking to start on the weekend by going to church, then we will meet with some finance people. Then on the following day we will hit the road and meet one to one with the delegates,” he said.

Southfield division which is one of the major farming areas in St Elizabeth is considered to be one of the JLP strongholds in the parish. The division has been represented by Myers since 1986 when he defeated the People’s National Party’s Septimus Gayle by a margin of 22 votes.