Claims of missing names from Grenada voters’ list dismissed

While the NNP says more than 1200 names are missing from the St.George South East constituency, the NDC says it was confident the discrepancies will be resolved.

ST. GEORGE’S, Grenada, Thursday January 17, 2013 - Supervisor of Elections, Judy Benoit, has rejected claims that thousands of names are missing from the voters’ list after concerns raised by the country’s two main political parties ahead of the February 19th General Election.

Benoit, who recently returned to work after recovering from a mild stroke, said the names were among those being corrected and so were not included on the last list printed for public scrutiny.

Her revelations come as hundreds rushed to beat a registration deadline which came into effect midnight Wednesday following the issuing of the writ by Governor General Sir Carlisle Glean.

“When I came back on Monday the 7th and enquired I learnt that some names were not on the last list that was printed and my inquiry led me to understand that these were all names sent back for correction. They are not actually missing,” said Benoit.

“They are in the system the people are registered but it’s just a matter of those that had errors were sent back for correction and the last list happened to be printed before  these names were actually sent back in the corrected form”.

Both the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) and the main opposition New National Party  (NNP) have released statements expressing concerns about the omitted names.

While the NNP says more than 1200 names are missing from the St George South East constituency, the NDC says it was confident the discrepancies will be resolved.

“Since I came back I gave them a deadline of Thursday the 10th to have the names corrected and back on and those that cannot be corrected in time to have it back on because it’s too crucial a  time to have names missing from a list,” the Supervisor of Elections  explained.

“I can assure you the names are already back on and we are going to print a new list on Monday and all the names of persons registered should be on that list”.

The Parliamentary Elections Office says about 55,000 persons have already registered to vote but that figure is expected to be higher when the final list is printed. (CMC) Click here to receive free news bulletins via email from Caribbean360. (View sample)