THE stunning performance of the Dr Peter Phillips-led ‘One PNP’ team in Sunday’s Regional Executive Council (REC) elections will have little or no impact on the September 7 presidential vote if the party’s General Secretary Julian Robinson has his way.

“The convention that the party has used is that elections at the RECs, those persons become eligible in the new political year. There are different views on it, but my recommendation is that we stick to the convention at this stage and not seek to disturb that convention,” Robinson told the Jamaica Observer yesterday.

“So I suspect that those persons will become eligible in the new political year and not for this political year,” added Robinson, who is leading the team finalising the voters’ list for the presidential election.

The final date for changes to the individuals on the voters’ list was Tuesday, and Robinson said his team has spent the past two days verifying the changes before the publication of the final list.

“We are now ensuring that the process was followed properly, in terms of the changes. Meaning that a meeting was held, members were notified, and that persons who are selected as delegates, or were changed, it was done in a democratic way.

“We intend to publish an updated list on August 30, which is Friday (tomorrow), and this will incorporate the changes that we received up to Tuesday,” added Robinson.

Supporters of the One PNP team have been gloating since Sunday when Phillips’ backers retained the leadership of all six Regional Executive Councils, and delegates voted against most of the supporters of the Peter Bunting-led ‘Rise United’ team in the election of representatives for the party’s National Executive Council (NEC), the PNP’s second highest decision-making body.

In Region One, five of the six people elected to the NEC have endorsed Phillips, while it was six out of seven for Phillips in Region Two.

It was 15-0 in favour of One PNP in Region Three where prominent Rise United members, including Councillor for the Payne Land Division in St Andrew South Western Eugene Kelly and the party’s former caretaker candidate for St Andrew West Rural, attorney-at-law Jennifer Housen, failed in their bids to make it to the NEC.

In Region Four, which comprises St Catherine and Clarendon, 17 people were elected to the NEC and it is believed that they have all endorsed Phillips. Nine of the 10 individuals elected to the NEC in Region Six are also reportedly members of the One PNP team.

Rise United bucked the trend in Region Five, which covers Manchester and St Elizabeth, with eight of the 13 elected NEC members supporting Bunting.

Some members of the One PNP team were expecting the new NEC members to be added to the voters’ list for September 7, but with the general secretary holding his ground and determined to stick to the convention, they are now pointing to the REC results as proof that the majority of delegates are firmly behind Phillips.

But the Bunting team had declared, even before the first vote was cast, that it would not expend energy to make the REC elections a proxy for the presidential face-off.

“As with the case of the four vice-presidency posts in which the Rise United campaign fielded no candidates to oppose the four sitting vice-presidents, so it is with the regional chairs,” said the Bunting team.

“At any rate, today’s (Sunday) elections will not provide any additional delegate support for the September 7 contest. Those elected today will serve as a part of the NEC for 2019/20, and therefore have no particular relevance for the September 7 contest to elect the party president.

“Rise United intends to continue a laser-like focus on September 7 and will not be distracted by anything else,” added the Bunting team.