The Tribune

By AVA TURNQUEST

Tribune Chief Reporter

aturnquest@tribunemedia.net

FREE National Movement candidate Reece Chipman yesterday blasted the Parliamentary Registration Department for its alleged failure to update its register with the names of more than 20 persons who registered at satellite registration sites some three weeks ago.

Mr Chipman, the FNM’s candidate for Centreville, lamented that the disparities he found on the updated register he received not only put his campaign at a disadvantage, but also throws the integrity of the process into question.

He claimed that a number of persons who registered at Centreville Primary School and Palmdale Primary School on or before January 16 were not reflected on the voter register as of yesterday.

When contacted by The Tribune, Parliamentary Commissioner Sherlyn Hall said that he was aware of the concerns and had instructed Mr Chipman to write to the department concerning the dispute so that an investigation could be launched.

Mr Hall told The Tribune that he could not give an exact number of registered voters at this time, but stated that the current total was now over 99,000.

Mr Chipman said: “It’s more than just an administrative problem with my campaign. We get an updated register every week and to have a register that was printed February 9 without people on it who have a receipt from November, something must be wrong with the process.

“We have people registering in Centreville in the primary school, who have been registered some from November, December, January and still their names haven’t hit the updated registry. I have their voter’s numbers, the receipts, and anything could happen to these things.

“I don’t want to speculate on what the problem is, because in a case like this I’m not sure if it’s getting from the school to the parliamentary registry. It has to be on them because they’re in control of the process but you cannot have a register not updated three weeks after someone registers.”

He added: “I’m disadvantaged yes, and now the people don’t even know if they’re registered. If they don’t have the capacity to handle this sort of thing, then they need to do something. This is some serious stuff.”

Mr Chipman questioned why the process wasn’t streamlined with an automated system that would network all satellite locations.