Today, November 30 approximately 71,530 names of dead persons have been removed from the updated voters’ list revealed the Electoral Office of Jamaica. Also, 24,016 persons were added to the list bringing the total number of registered voters to 1,897,146.
This is a part of a series of steps that is being taken, leading up to the general elections constitutionally due in 2021.
The EOJ further revealed that this number of purged dead voters, which falls between May and November of this year, is the largest figure recently.
Another step that was taken was the renewal of voters’ identification cards. It has been a battle to implement the replacement card – National Identification System – which was expected to be passed this year in Parliament.
The government had proposed that similar to the social security number that is granted to persons living in the United States of America, NIDS would have allowed only one card to be used for all transactions. However, the Chief Justice, the Hon. Mr. Justice Bryan Sykes led a unanimous ruling that labelled NIDS as unconstitutional, null and void. Before NIDS, the expired cards were still being used to facilitate smooth transactions as it was the hope of the government to have NIDS in effect by 2020. The masses of the country were not pleased based on the limitations of human privacy as it required biometric information, which seemed ‘too far too soon’. Therefore, the next step was to renew the voters’ ID, so that persons would be eligible for voting when elections are called.
Under the legislation, it was outlined that any Jamaican citizen, 18 years or older, can vote in elections.
As part of the renewal process, the EOJ revealed that persons with identification cards issued in 2015 or before should visit an EOJ constituency office or ID Card Renewal Centre. Persons who fall in this category are urged to renew their cards but the validity of the expired card has been extended to December 2020 – meaning it can still be used.
The EOJ, in a statement today, attributed the increase to its ‘dead elector removal exercise’, which moved to phase two in March this year.
Phase two is aimed at confirming reports of electors identified as deceased during house-to-house visits in the first phase and on an ongoing basis through information from several sources, the EOJ explained.
In a Jamaica Gleaner article, Director of Elections Glasspole Brown says so far, he is pleased with the progress of the dead elector removal project. “Our team has been working hard to identify and confirm the identity of dead electors on the voters’ list and we are pleased with the results thus far,” he said.
Persons with identification cards issued in 2016 or after will automatically receive a new ID card at their constituency office once the cards are ready. Meanwhile, the EOJ stated that voter identification cards for persons added to the list published today will become available by mid-December and should be collected at the EOJ office, in the constituency where they reside.
These are all viable steps being made and it is in the hope that voters' needs are duly respected and this continues to be a smooth process.
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