They asked for money for their votes, says JLP candidate
DESMOND SMITH, the Jamaica Labour Party’s (JLP) candidate for the Lorrimers division in Trelawny Southern, has sought to defend himself following reports that residents of Wait-A-Bit accused him of disrespecting them, as he is asserting that individuals had sought to sell him their votes.
Smith, who was contesting the Lorrimers division against the People’s National Party’s (PNP) councillor candidate Gregory Clarke, was speaking to The Gleaner following the close of voting proceedings in Monday’s local government elections, on the heels of reports that several residents of the Allside community in Wait-A-Bit had shifted allegiance to the PNP in protest against him.
“What happened today [Monday] was that I reached a particular spot, and there were guys standing up in normal-coloured clothing, white and so forth. They stopped me, and about four of them came close to the vehicle and they were asking for money for their votes,” Smith said starkly.
“I said, ‘No, this is not possible’, because situations like this, I don’t really buy votes, nor do I even want to take out a dollar for anybody to see and take a picture of me handing money to anyone. So they were upset, and they stepped off and said, ‘Okay, man, you disrespected us’, and I said,‘Well, I have to protect my seat, so if you see that as disrespect, fine’. I drove off, only to find out that in a short while, those PNP clothing that they had, they just put them on,”Smith added.
During Monday’s proceedings, the protesters in Allside reported to The Gleaner that Smith had told them that he did not need their votes in order to win the election in the Lorrimers division.
The residents also accused their political representatives of exhibiting a lack of care for the division and the wider Trelawny Southern constituency, citing inconsistent water supply and employment opportunities for farmers in the area.
Ironically, roughly two minutes’ drive away from the protest site, mostly JLP supporters were congregating at the Wait-A-Bit Primary School’s designated polling site without incident.
In the meantime, Smith maintained that he would not become party to rogue politics.
“I am confident that at the end of the counting, victory will be ours by a good margin. I am one person who doesn’t buy votes, and If I can’t win cleanly, let it be,”said Smith.“You will see from the result that in spite of that situation, the seat will be won clearly by the JLP.”
During Monday’s election process elsewhere in Trelawny Southern, to include the Albert Town, Ulster Spring, and Warsop divisions, voting proceeded largely incident-free despite heavy afternoon showers limiting the voting proceedings.