CAFFE still short 1,700 volunteers
By Lynford Simpson, Staff Reporter

Father Jim Webb, Board Secretary for CAFFE, responds to questions at The Gleaner's Editors' Forum on Wednesday, at the company's North Street offices. - Michael Sloley /Freelance Photographer

CITIZENS ACTION for Free and Fair Elections (CAFFE), the local observer group, is still short of nearly 1,700 volunteers with just under three weeks before the October 16 general election.

The group, which is currently running advertisements in the media with a view to recruiting 2,500 volunteers, may also be forced to curtail some of its election day activities if a $9 million grant from the European Union is not received by early next week.

Father Jim Webb, Board Secretary for CAFFE, and Fabian Brown, a Board member, raised the concerns on Wednesday while speaking with editors and senior reporters at The Gleaner's Editors' Forum at the company's North Street offices. They remain optimistic, however, that they will have the required number of volunteers in place by Election Day.

"We have about 800 at the moment but people have been signing up much more rapidly in the last week than they have in the last two months," Father Webb said. He attributed the increase in the number of people expressing an interest to volunteer, to Sunday's announcement of the election date by Prime Minister P.J. Patterson.

"There's that kind of energy that flows once the gate is flown that doesn't seem to be there before so we are trying to capitalise on that," the Board Secretary explained.

Like the Electoral Office of Jamaica (EOJ), CAFFE will be targeting garrison and potential swing constituencies like West Central St. Andrew. "We're hoping to put some emphasis on marginal constituencies and to look at some of the garrisons," Father Webb noted.

He stressed that CAFFE will focus on those constituencies deemed to be double garrisons, with large blocs of supporters of the two major political parties - the governing People's National Party (PNP) and opposition Jamaica Labour Party (JLP).

CAFFE's election budget is $22 million, but only about 60 per cent of the amount is in place. The money is used to train volunteers, print manuals, manufacture CAFFE bibs which are worn by volunteers, print identification cards, transportation, general stationery and office supplies.

With the $9 million promised by the EU not yet in its coffers, CAFFE is worried about the likely effect this could have on its operations, including the type of technology it is able to afford and the quality and timeliness of its reporting activities.

CAFFE was formed in 1997 to monitor the general election held in December of that year. About 1,000 volunteers worked on that occasion.