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Clarendon Roundup
Report by George Henry, Gleaner Writer, Spaldings, Clarendon
Voting in the four Parish Council divisions for the Local Government Elections in North West Clarendon was not only slow, but low as well. Although several polling stations were opened on time or in some cases a few minutes late, at a number of them, election day workers had very little to do for most of the morning.
When The Gleaner visited a cluster of three polling stations at the Alston High School, in the Spaldings Division at 11:30 am, the supervisor Ms. Marcia Benjamin reported that poling divisions 7, 9 and 10 had only 41, 79 and 40 persons casting their ballot out of 105, 370 and 135 eligible voters respectively.
Meantime, a police officer who was on hand, said all was well as steps were taken to ensure appropriate security.
At the nearby Baillieston Primary School where there was also a cluster of four polling stations, and where Election Day workers far out-numbered voters, polling divisions 11, 12, 22 and 29 saw 56, 55, 65 and 21 persons voting out of a total of 157, 185, 157 and 102 persons on the voters lists respectively at about 11:45 am.
Election Day workers at the polling stations also stated that they did not expect to see a high voter turnout. There was low voter turnout at the St. Paul’s Anglican Church in Spaldings; of the 283 eligible voters, only 71 voted at the lone polling station on the compound at 12 noon.
It was, however, almost business as usual in the town of Spaldings when The Gleaner passed through just after 12:15pm. The usual traffic congestion was absent – this seemed due in part to the closure of schools in the area. Yet many public passenger vehicles were still around.
At the Spaldings Primary School where three polling stations all together had a total of 624 eligible voters only a total of 168 cast their vote up to 12:20pm.
The low voter turnout was also evident at the Ritches Primary School in the Ritches division. If school teacher and incumbent councillor Elvris Marshall (PNP) and accountant Orville Salmon (JLP) were expecting a high voter turnout, they would have been disappointed. At 1:00 pm polling stations 33, 34, 35 and 36 only 98, 48, 60 and 36 persons out of 318, 145, 122 and 127 eligible voters had cast their ballot up to that time. At the Belcarres Basic School at polling division 38, only 102 out of 312 persons voted up to 1:05pm.
The situation was similar at the Frankfield Primary School. Supervisor Naseef Brown told The Gleaner that the three polling stations on the compound, where all together 750 persons were eligible to vote; only 243 had done so up to 1:45pm. Mr. Brown who was also the supervisor for two polling divisions at Trout Hall reported that less than 20 per cent of those on the voters list cast their ballot up to 12 noon.
When the Gleaner visited the five polling stations at the Edwin Allen High where a total of 1,000 voters were down to vote, just under 200 of that number did so at 1:55pm. The supervisor Mr. A. Latty who was present told The Gleaner that though a low turn out was expected, as has been the trend in local government elections in the constituency, this year’s poll has been extremely slow when compared with previous ones.
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