ECJ embarks on elector verification exercise

THE ELECTORAL Commission of Jamaica (ECJ) will begin a special elector verification exercise to update the voters’ list next month. The aim of the exercise is to accelerate the identification and removal of electors on the current voters’ list who have died since 1998.

A major component of the initiative is an islandwide house-tohouse verification of electors, which is slated to get under way in November. The project entails trained and identifiable verifiers visiting the homes of 1.1 million electors 40 years and older to collect the necessary information, over a four-month period. After the exercise, electors who are identified and confirmed as dead will be removed from the voters’ list.

Glasspole Brown, director of elections, explains that the removal of deceased electors has statistical and financial benefits for taxpayers and will eventually lead to reduced spending on election preparation and more accurate statistics on voter turnout.

“Whenever an election is called, we must prepare for a 100 per cent turnout, that is, all the electors on the list. When we remove the electors confirmed as dead, then we will be able to spend less on elections as we prepare for a more accurate number of voters. Therefore, we would be printing fewer ballots and utilising fewer polling stations, for example,” he said.

The ECJ is seeking to enlist the support of political, public and private-sector stakeholders who possess information on electors who have died since 1998. An appeal will also be made to the public to provide information on their relatives or acquaintances who passed away during the period, as part of the public-education campaign for the initiative.

A recruitment drive for temporary verifiers and data entry clerks will take place over the next three weeks.

The ECJ carried out a similar exercise in 2012 for electors 70 years and older and was able to remove 54,000 persons using this method. The ECJ expects to remove more than 200,000 names from the voters’ list with this exercise.

CONTRIBUTED Prime Minister Andrew Holness (third left) greets President of the Republic of Kenya Uhuru Kenyatta, prior to their bilateral talks yesterday, at the United Nations (UN) headquarters in New York. The prime minister is attending the 73rd UN General Assembly. With Prime Minister Holness (from left) are Senator Matthew Samuda and Minister of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade, Senator Kamina Johnson Smith.

FILE Camille Maragh (left) voting location assistant assisting a police officer at the Greater Portmore police station to locate his name before he voted on Monday February 22, 2016.