By KHRISNA VIRGIL

Deputy Chief Reporter

kvirgil@tribunemedia.net

THE Free National Movement has raised “grave concerns” regarding the general election 2017 voter register, among them the discovery of 72 pages of duplicate registrations, names printed of persons born over 200 years ago and some who were born in 2017, according to party Chairman Sidney Collie yesterday.

Describing this as “negligence” and “ineptitude”, Mr Collie said there are other “irregularities” that have come to light pointing to persons who were reportedly issued citizenship and voter’s cards on the same day.

Despite the push on all political sides for Bahamians to get out and register to vote, Mr Collie said Parliamentary Registration officials were still “putting road blocks” at some registration centres. These obstacles, he said, deny Bahamians the opportunity to exercise their free and democratic rights.

And while the party painted a grim picture of the integrity of the voting process, FNM Leader Dr Hubert Minnis was not present. Party officials were asked why this was the case. The reply was that an earlier notification that he would be at the press conference had been sent in error.

Mr Collie went on to note that the party was also concerned that the Parliamentary Registration Department was not operating as a coherent unit, but running two operations – one led by Parliamentary Commissioner Sherlyn Hall and the other by the permanent secretary.

Mr Collie added that the FNM was worried about several voter registration centres, such as the Remnant Tabernacle Church Hall, St Barnabas, Jean Street and St Anne’s. He did not go into detail about this particular issue.

But despite the troubling state of this process, Mr Collie said the party was not pressing for the removal of Mr Hall because it was simply too late for a new team.

However, he said, these officials needed to “clean up” the register as he suggested there may be attempts by the Christie administration to “steal the election.”

“Yesterday afternoon, we reached out to the parliamentary commissioner to notify him that we had found 72 pages of duplicate voter registrations; persons born over 200 years ago and persons born in 2017 all on the current register,” Mr Collie said at the FNM’s headquarters at Mackey Street.

“Also of grave concern to us today are other irregularities that have been brought to our attention, including persons who were issued citizenship and voter’s cards on the same day. Even though the Registration Department continues to encourage Bahamians to register to vote, they are putting roadblocks at some voter registration centres, which deny Bahamians the opportunity to exercise their free and democratic rights.

“To add to the chaos at the Registration Department, we understand that there are now two separate and distinct operations, with one being led by the parliamentary commissioner and the other being led by the permanent secretary. To add insult to injury the staff members have been split in half, one group reporting to the parliamentary commissioner, being paid and receiving allowances on time and also being directed to perform specialised tasks. The second operation led by the permanent secretary have been denied payments and allowances and are directed to perform other tasks.”

He continued: “In this 50th year since the Bahamas’ Majority Rule, there is one thing Bahamian voters agree on, when democracy can work, democracy works. We also know that the most important job of any government is to maintain a free and fair election, which can only be held with a clean register.

“Unfortunately today, the register is not clean. It appears this government has a propensity for promoting confusion, dishonesty and chaos as was evident in every election for which the PLP has had oversight. Regrettably the FNM does not trust this PLP government to willingly adhere to local and internationally accepted democratic principles when it comes to the conduct of free and fair elections.

“For five years we have seen this government cast aside the needs of our communities, as they focused on helping themselves and their allies at the people’s expense. They have turned government corruption into an art form.”

“We call upon the Christie government not to repeat the fiasco of 1987, in which the outcome was stolen. The FNM and the Bahamian people will not allow this government to steal the election. We hold this Christie-led government and his minister responsible for elections to ensure every Bahamian citizen is able to exercise their democratic right without political shenanigans,” Mr Collie said.

Discovery

Mr Collie told reporters yesterday that Parliamentary Registration officials have not withheld any changes to the register from the FNM, saying the organisation received regularly updates and was able to use this to discover the plethora of issues.

“That is the reason why we were able to analyse 72 pages of complete irregularity. We have shared this with the parliamentary commissioner from our own IT specialists, our consultants and our in house special people.

“We suspect that they don’t have everything they need to do a good job. (We hope) the free will assistance of the FNM in identifying for them all of the issues we have discovered (will be put to use).

“We have discovered persons born in 1764 on the register, 1787, 1878, 2017 and from our own analysis we have multiple registrations of the same persons with the same name middle name (and) date of birth in multiple constituencies.

“As I said before, the FNM will not allow the PLP to conduct an election under these circumstances. This register must be cleaned up and we are doing our part to ensure that it is.”

Asked if the party accepted Mr Hall’s explanation earlier this week that the errors were clerical and made in human error, Mr Collie said the mistakes of this magnitude were negligent.

He questioned why the process had not been improved to move away from handwritten documents.

“Human error of 72 pages of routine errors, this is negligence and ineptitude. There is some human error, no doubt.

“That brings me to the point of in the age of such technology my five-year-old grand daughter is now using technology like an expert in this age, why for the mercy of God is the Parliamentary Registration Department still handwriting in 2017 important data and statistical information to comprise the voter registration?

“Why can’t the NIB card, the passport and other documentation be scanned into the system and uploaded into a national database and the use of technology be used so that we can minimise human error?

“There is no excuse for it. The government says it has a first class e-government system, (well) put that e-government system into the Parliamentary Registration Department,” Mr Collie said.

On Wednesday, Mr Hall vowed that his department will clean up the voter register and “get it right” after a report revealed a myriad of errors.

Mr Hall emphasised at the time that the register was a manual system, and as such, most of the discrepancies were due to human error at the data-entry level.

Insisting that “no typo” will jeopardise the election, he advised that his department took responsibility for the mistakes and noted they have 14 to 15 days to clean up the register once it is closed.

As for duplicate registrants, he maintained that the onus was on each applicant not to commit perjury by registering more than once.

The discrepancies were first published by The Nassau Guardian.

Attempts were made to contact Mr Hall yesterday, but he could not be reached up to press time.