SANTA CRUZ, St Elizabeth — DEPUTY leader in charge of the ruling Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) Area Council Four, Dr Chris Tufton says his executive is set to agree on the party’s “slate of candidates” for parliamentary and local government elections “before September”, well ahead of November’s annual conference.

Area Council Four embraces the western parishes of Trelawny, St James, Hanover, Westmoreland, and St Elizabeth.

Parliamentary elections are constitutionally due late next year, while the local government polls have been repeatedly delayed since becoming due last year.

Tufton told Observer West that “internal party issues and candidate selection” formed part of the agenda for the regular meeting of the Area Council’s executive at the Top Hill Primary School in South East St Elizabeth on Sunday.

He declined to get into specifics regarding candidate selection but said “all constituencies and divisions are subject” to assessment.

“We are looking at those without representation and we are looking at those with representation,” said Tufton, who was recently reassigned as Cabinet Minister from the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries to Industry, Investment and Commerce.

He said internal polls formed part of a structured programme of assessment.

Following last Sunday’s business session, host Member of Parliament Frank Witter confidently assured a public session that he was on target to retain SE St Elizabeth for the JLP. Witter said his representational work was going well in a range of infrastructural developmental areas including education, roads and water.

SE St Elizabeth, once considered a safe seat for the opposition People’s National Party (PNP), is considered by observers to be a ‘weathervane’ for the next parliamentary elections.

In 2007, Witter defeated the PNP’s Norman Horne by 456 votes, as the JLP won the national (60-seat) elections by four seats following 18 years of PNP governance.