Poll Finds Majority Of Jamaicans Want General Elections By March

KINGSTON, Jamaica (CMC) – The majority of Jamaicans are in favour of Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller calling the general elections by the end of March, according to an opinion poll released here, on Wednesday.

General elections are not due here until December, but there has been widespread speculation that Prime Minister Simpson Miller will announce the date ahead of the constitutional deadline.

According to the RJR Group-commissioned poll, conducted by Don Anderson, 68 per cent of respondents say, they are in favour of having the election in the first three months of this year.

“Sixty-eight per cent of all persons we interviewed said, yes, elections should be held in the first three months of the year, as against 27 per cent who were opposed. So, there is overwhelming support for elections in the first three months of the year,” Anderson told RJR radio.

“From all indications, that may very well become the reality; we don’t know for sure, because nobody has announced anything yet,” he added.

Anderson said, that the poll also found that the majority of Jamaicans are in favour of having a fixed date for general elections.

“The general public is overwhelmingly in support of a fixed election date. Eighty per cent of all persons interviewed, 18 years and over, and interviewed between the eighth and 12^th of January, felt that we should have a fixed date for election rather than the situation which follows the Westminster approach where the decision is left to the ruling party to determine,” Anderson said.

“So 80 per cent of all people felt there should be a fixed election date and 18 per cent are not in favour,” he added.

Last year, Prime Minister Simpson Miller said, she was waiting the touch from God before announcing the date for the next general election.

She also said, that the date for the polls would only be known after the voters list is published.

On Tuesday, former finance minister, Audely Shaw, urged the prime minister to delay polls until the voters’ list has been cleaned up.

“Names are on the list that should not be on the list,” he said, adding “an election is about to be called on a voters’ list that has between 400,000 and 500,000 names that should not be on it”.

He called on Prime Minister Simpson Miller to ensure that nobody touches her.

“Don’t make the Master touch you until the voters’ list clean up,” he said, to which Prime Minister Simpson Miller replied, off microphone, ”I have already been touched”.

In the last general election, the ruling People’s National Party won 42 of the 63 seats with the remaining going to the main opposition Jamaica Labour Party (JLP).