With the crucial Kingston and St Andrew Municipal Corporation (KSAMC) tied 20-20 between the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) and People’s National Party (PNP) after Monday’s local government election, the Electoral Office of Jamaica (EOJ) has transferred the final count of votes in the St Andrew East Rural constituency to its Duke Street head office in downtown Kingston.

According to Director of Elections Glasspole Brown, the pre-emptive move is to avoid any angst at the counting centre as the outcome will have an impact on which party controls the KSAMC, regarded as the Crown Jewel in the island’s 14 local government authorities.

“We are doing our assessment of different locations and the counting and, given the situation in Kingston and St Andrew, where currently, based on the preliminary data, there is a tie. So we are seeking as best as possible to ensure that no tension occurs in that counting centre,” Brown told the Jamaica Observer on Tuesday.

Brown said that the final counting for that constituency will start Wednesday morning, and that the EOJ will be reviewing other critical areas as the process continues.

He said final counting began on Tuesday morning for all other constituencies and he is anticipating that by Wednesday afternoon into Thursday morning the process should be complete.

In an EOJ release issued on Tuesday, Brown explained that under the Representation of the People Act (ROPA), the director of elections may change the place selected for the final counting of ballots.

He said that according to Section 45(2A) of the Act, the chief electoral officer, whenever he is satisfied that it is expedient to change the place designated for the final count, may direct the returning officer: (a) to carry out the final count of votes at such place as the chief electoral officer may specify and to notify each candidate, within 24 hours, of the issue of such a direction; and (b) to postpone for a period not exceeding 48 hours in any one instance, the carrying out of the final count of votes, and to forthwith communicate notice of any such postponement to each candidate.

Meanwhile, late Tuesday afternoon Brown confirmed that the JLP had won Aenon Town Division in Clarendon in the final count, but reminded that “not all the divisions have been finally counted as yet”.

Earlier, a Jamaica Information Service news release reported him as saying that as soon as the final results are available they will be released to the public.

The State news agency said that preliminary results indicate that the JLP won seven of the municipal corporations
— St Thomas, Portland, St Mary, St Ann, Trelawny, St James and St Elizabeth, while the PNP had won Hanover, Westmoreland, Manchester, and St Catherine.

The EOJ also said the preliminary voter turnout for the local government election was 29.6 per cent.

In the meantime, Brown said that based on his assessment, the election went fairly smoothly across the island, save for some glitches which impeded the flow of the process.

Among these, he said, were people turning up at polling stations without their identification and having to take the oath; and there was a fatal shooting incident near Flanker Primary School in St James which caused the polling station there to be closed for over an hour.

“Overall, we think it went smoothly and we are happy CAFFE (Citizens Action for Free and Fair Elections) gave us a stamp of approval that everything was fair and transparent in terms of the process,” he said.

Addressing reports that some CAFFE observers were not allowed to oversee the final count of ballots at polling stations across the island, Brown said this will be investigated, “but based on what I have heard they were allowed in some polling stations.”

“We do have a good working relationship [with CAFFE] and we would like and still enjoy that sort of working relationship going forward,” he said.

In response to charges that counting of the votes was slow, Brown said that there is a process that has to be followed as the EOJ has to wait until the ballots are totalled or they are transported from a polling station from various parts of the island to a counting centre.

He said that by 9:00 pm Monday “Everybody had a good feel of where the trend was going in terms of the different parish municipalities. We had to ensure that all the checks and balances were done before releasing the preliminary count, and it’s a matter of how quickly numbers are [fed] into the counting centres in the different constituencies, and I think, certainly, that the western end of the island was impacted to a certain extent by rain and so on to get into the polling stations”.

In terms of the slow transfer of information on the platform that EOJ provided for the results, Brown said he would have to get a report on this, but based on his understanding, the technical issues were not from the EOJ’s end.

“For us to provide that [information], we are in a partnership with providers of the telecommunication service, so I am expecting a report on that as to what transpired,” he said, noting however that by midnight “everybody was quite aware of all the information”.

Brown also reported that the ballot box for St James Southern was recovered following an accident in which a vehicle being driven by an EOJ external supervisor overturned into a ravine in the Catadupa area while en route to an electoral centre in Cambridge.

“The ballot box was retrieved from that car, put into another car that was travelling behind in the convoy and was taken to the counting centre last [Monday] night,” he said, noting that he was thankful there were no serious injuries to the individual.