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EBC Board must resign

By RICHARD LORD

THE Lennox Deyalsingh Commission of Enquiry into the operations of the Elections and Boundaries Commission has recommended that all the Commissioners “tender their resignations to His Excellency the President”.

This is the first of 23 recommendations contained in the report of the Commission which was presented to President Arthur NR Robinson on Monday.

A copy of the report was subsequently presented to Prime Minister Patrick Manning, and is expected to be discussed at today’s Cabinet meeting.

EBC chairman Oswald Wilson told the Express last night that he had “no great desire to continue at the EBC” after working there for some 34 years.

He however questioned the basis on which the commission of enquiry recommended that he and the other EBC commissioners resign.

Another major recommendation of the Commission of Enquiry is: “That a suitably qualified person in management and knowledgeable in human resources and information systems be recruited on contract to the post of Chief Election Officer.”

The Commission of Enquiry also recommended that “the EBC immediately revisit and redo the entire field check exercises carried out in the 2001 house-to-house survey in the marginal constituencies”.

The report said this exercise should be done before the next general election and "be continued in the remaining constituencies as soon as is practicable thereafter”.
The Commission of Enquiry began on April 8 and ended last month.

It was set up to investigate the conduct of the EBC in the holding of the 2000 and 2001 general elections.

In spite of widespread allegations of voter-padding, the enquiry did not find any such incidents but wants the EBC to, as a matter of policy, “refer to the police all cases of registration transactions which after a proper field check are found to be invalid.”

The report is also asking that the EBC do at least three things immediately:

• ensure the security of all Registration Record Cards and other Registration Documents

•take steps to cancel the Registration Record Cards of all electors whose names have been deleted from the Electoral List; and

• obtain information on persons falling under section 15 (1) (a) and (b) of the Act and update the electoral list on a continuous basis in respect of these persons.

The commission also spoke of the need for the EBC to “streamline its registration and re-registration procedures to ensure that ID cards are available to the registrant within one month from the date of application”.

The commission recommended too that “a competent attorney (to) be appointed to carry out a review of the Representation of the People Act”.

Trinidad and Tobago News

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