In the following interview, conducted by The Anguillian newspaper, the Supervisor of Elections, Ms. Aurjul Wilson, explained where the electoral process is in terms of registration to vote and arrangements to move that process forward as the time draws near for the voting. The 2020 electioneering in Anguilla is for the usual general election in the seven districts and, for the first time, the island-wide voting for four seats. The interview is in the form of a question and answer dialogue between Nat Hodge and Ms. Wilson.
Where is the electoral process currently?
We continue to encourage people to come in to update their status which is just basically to add their photograph and date of birth to our database. The reason is that we have a lot of people in Anguilla with the same name and some persons who did not register might decide to come to vote. For example if on Election Day, there are six Tom Jones’, those persons might come to vote and the legitimate registered voter maybe delayed or not be able to vote. So with the photograph and date of birth we will be able to discern who would have registered and is qualified to vote.
We are going to be issuing, at some point, a Voter Registration Card. It has a bar code which carries the voter’s photograph, name, district in which he or she is registered to vote and occupation. Prior to this, we would ask voters at the polling stations to state their name, address and occupation. Then we would cross reference that information with our lists. This time, we will have scanners to scan the card with the bar code, and the information will come up on our screens. We would then know who you are and you will get your ballot. This should speed up the process.
Do you see this as a big improvement over the previous arrangement?
Yes, for several reasons. Among those reasons is that it alleviates the long lines and we would not have to search through our lists so much to see who is voting. Secondly, it allows persons to have their information on a card that is valid for ten years.
There were a number of recommendations from the 2017 Constitutional and Electoral Reform Committee Report. As a result of those recommendations, the required legislation is being prepared.
I am happy to see, and say, that a Bill for a new Elections Act has been progressed. The Attorney General Chambers is going through the final stages of the Bill for last minute editing and formatting. It means the draft legislation will soon be taken to the House of Assembly for debate and approval. I anticipate that by the middle of August, or soon after, that should be done.
With just over 600 days before the elections, exactly where is the Electoral Office in terms of other key preparations?
I think we are fairly prepared, but the biggest drawback now is to obtain the machine to print and scan the cards. Once we have that, the cards could be issued to the 10,786 people we have in our database. But that is not such a bad thing because the vendor for the machine has told us that it would take about 30 days to run off that amount of cards and we still have some time.
We are also in the process of getting additional ballot boxes because some of the existing ones have termites. We are going to try to source a more durable type of material – like hard plastic – for the new boxes. It will be something that we can easily stack in order not to take up too much space. That is because we now have to double the number of ballot boxes we have. This is occasioned by the island-wide ballots which will be deposited in separate boxes. If you came to the polling station on Election Day, you will be given your ballot which is another thing we are designing. We are trying to figure out how we can get the ballot designed so that we don’t have to have voters to stand in two lines to vote. The aim is to have one ballot paper, hopefully perforated in the middle, with the name of the district candidates on one side and the name of the island-wide candidates on the other side.
In order to get people through the lines in the shortest time, we will have to engage in an aggressive education of voters so that they would know what to do when they get to the polling stations and is handed the ballots. They will have to vote for two sets of people – four candidates on one hand for the island-wide election and one candidate for the district.
We have not started that education process yet because we want to ensure that the legislation, until it goes to the House of Assembly, we can at least begin the conversation so that people can understand what the process is.
Where does the Electoral Office stand in terms of finance for the elections?
The Central Electoral Office is under the umbrella of the Department of Public Administration. We have a line item there but except, and until, there is an election, a budget isn’t really prepared. Next year, in the 2019 budget cycle, we will prepare and submit an estimate of related election expenses to obtain funding.
The Governor’s Office has promised some financial support, but I am still waiting for that. In the meantime, I will do what I can with what I have. Public Administration has been really helpful in terms of providing supplies we need, on a day to day basis, but we try not to be too bothersome. The real push comes in 2019.
What about recruiting persons to assist with the field work in the electoral process?
That is going well actually, because we have contacted all the officers who served in the 2015 general election to see if they were interested in serving for the 2020 election. Those who do not wish to serve again will be replaced. We will then need to advertise to fill the various positions for the additional workers to come onboard. But we tend to look for persons who have prior experience and exposure. Being part of the process takes a lot of time because we have to do weeks of training and, unfortunately, some people in the private sector cannot get off the time to do the training – so therefore one will see that the overwhelming majority of the persons serving at election time being public servants. That is because public servants get a little leeway with regard to time to assist with election matters.
What is your message to the electorate at this time?
I would like for our people to engage in the electoral process. We have been hearing a majority persons saying they don’t want to vote. I do not know why they don’t want to vote, but I think that when you live in a community you ought to be part of the political process. You should vote. You ought to come and register, and that is what I would like to see more people coming out and doing.
Currently we have 10, 876 persons on the Voters’ Register. On the 4th day of each quarter we delete deceased voters from the list obtained from the local Registry of Births and Deaths. What we don’t get – and what would be nice for the people to help us with – are those persons who are on our list but who died overseas. If they die overseas, there is no record of their death locally, so if relatives and friends have a death certificate, or even a funeral programme showing that a person has died, we can cross reference it with our data base and then remove that name from the voters’ list so that the list is not inflated.
Worthy of note is that the proposed legislation makes provision for an enumeration in 2022. It basically means that we will condemn the old voters list and in that year there will be a new list. In the meantime, persons who have objections to anybody on the current list are advised that there is a process outlined in the legislation which allows them to make a claim against that person. However, you have to substantiate the basis for your claim. You can’t say Aurjul Wilson is not supposed to be on the list, that is not enough. You must have a reason why I should not be there. Once a voters list is certified, that is the list that pertains until the next enumeration.
I know there have been several politicians who have approached the Governor with regard to scrapping the existing list. The Governor doesn’t have the authority to do that. Unless there is a new enumeration, the list stays as is. The way a person gets on the voters’ list is that he or she would have qualified under the conditions at that time – not because the person has since moved to Timbuktu. He or she may still have property and or assets in Anguilla. The Constitution gives him or her the right to be on that list.
But really, where does the Central Electoral Office stand in the case of Anguillians living abroad and returning to Anguilla to vote – which has been a matter of controversy over the years?
There is nothing, as far as I know, to stop this. I don’t know if the Government, or the powers that be, would have a referendum to say that those people can’t come to vote. But as long as those persons are registered I have to give them a ballot. As long as you are qualified to vote on Anguilla, I don’t care if you lived in America for 92 years but at the time you were registered as a voter in Anguilla. However, there may be a difference in 2022 when we will have the enumeration because it requires enumeration officers to go house to house, and if you are not there you won’t be registered.
Finally, Ms. Wilson, it must be a very exciting experience for you to be intimately engaged in administering the electoral process. How do you respond?
I am excited that we are moving from one era to the next and that we are becoming more automated. One of the things I am extremely excited about is that instead of counting the ballots at one central place, we are going to do like a number of other islands, in the region, where the votes are counted locally [in the districts]. For instance, if you live in Island Harbour, and the polls have closed, we will start the counting there. We will not be bringing the ballots to the House of Assembly as we have been doing for years. We may start to count maybe 45 minutes after the polls are closed, you should have the results within two hours.
In the last general election in Anguilla in 2015, we finished at 5.30 am. That was ridiculous in a small island. It was taxing not only for me, but the election officers as well. We had to recount the votes in some of the bigger districts because some of the numbers did not add up. While that was being done, people were still waiting. At the House of Assembly we had three radio stations broadcasting the proceedings simultaneously as there were only three counting stations while the others were waiting to come on. I recall being at West End where there were a small number of voters. We could have simply stayed there and count the votes but we drove from West End to the House of Assembly and waited for the next counting. It made no sense and was a waste of time and resources.
How about the proposed revision of the boundaries – do we have time for that?
Apparently not. I have been informed that the legislation to create the electoral boundaries will not be advanced. This is in terms of breaking up the districts to make them equally representative. That is not going to happen for the 2020 elections. I have been advised what will happen, is the voting for the four island-wide seats.
The proposed legislation allows for the Supervisor of Elections to divide the polling divisions but I am a bit leery about that because it will just create more confusion. So we will do with what we have and we will ensure that the election process is fair and free.
