KRYSTAL Lee rode a sweeping wave of individual and party popularity to upstage People’s National Party (PNP) incumbent Dr Dayton Campbell for the St Ann North Western seat, yesterday.

After last evening’s count, Lee, a Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) councillor from the St Mary Municipal Corporation who attended school in Brown’s Town, St Ann, pulled off one of the biggest upsets that put brakes on Campbell’s bid for a third term as Member of Parliament for St Ann North Western. The preliminary numbers showed she amassed 7,821 votes to Campbell’s 5,783.

Independent candidate Peter Shand, a St Ann businessman and former PNP organiser who got 783 votes, was no match for Lee.

Before the polls closed yesterday, Lee’s supporters had been upbeat, pointing to the expert manner in which the JLP candidate mobilised voters in the constituency, even in communities which historically had gone in favour of the PNP.

Carlton Day, one of Lee’s polling division ground supervisors, even pointed to her likeability when interviewed by the Jamaica Observer in the community of Bamboo, one of the traditional PNP strongholds.

“This is the first time in over 40 years we are feeling this type of vibe here,” Day said from his polling station base at Bamboo Primary School.

“We have a new candidate — Miss Lee — who is very popular, and that has created a whole heap of momentum, so we are quite confident we are going to win this election,” Day said, long before the results were announced.

In the 2016 General Election, Campbell had beaten the JLP’s Othneil Lawrence by a few hundred votes in St Ann North Western. In 2011, Campbell however won the seat by more than 1,000 votes.

Though Lee, a manager at a prominent petrol company, is the ultimate winner, it might have been Shand who landed the significant body blow when he went independent, hence depriving Campbell of potential PNP votes.

Ahead of yesterday’s general election, there was speculation about how the day’s proceedings would have been affected by delays related to COVID-19 safety measures in place at polling stations.

Physical distancing guidelines caused long queues at a number of locations, while there were some delays due to cases in which eligible voters without voter’s identification had to be sworn in. As a result, there were reports that some frustrated electors had turned back without casting their ballot.

Some pundits were concerned that a rainy weather forecast would affect the voter turnout, but in the end the widespread feeling was that Campbell, the St Ann-based medical practitioner, lost crucial campaign momentum due to Shand’s switch.