Gail Alexan­der

Se­nior Po­lit­i­cal Re­porter

The Elec­tion and Bound­aries Com­mis­sion’s draft or­der on its re­view of con­stituen­cy bound­aries (2024), which was laid in Par­lia­ment in April, re­quires on­ly a sim­ple ma­jor­i­ty vote for pas­sage when it comes up in the House to­day.

It pro­posed new names for five con­stituen­cies and bound­ary shifts in 16 con­stituen­cies. That will in­volve a shift­ing of polling di­vi­sions and vot­ers in­to or out of ad­join­ing con­stituen­cies.

Con­stituen­cies are be­ing re­named to bet­ter re­flect the ar­eas with­in a con­stituen­cy. They are:

• ↓Arou­ca/Mal­oney to be re­named Trinci­ty/Mal­oney.

• ↓D’Abadie/O’Meara—Mal­abar/Mau­si­ca.

• ↓Lopinot/Bon Air West—Arou­ca/Lopinot.

• ↓St Joseph—Aranguez/St Joseph.

• ↓Pointe-a-Pierre—Clax­ton Bay.

Apart from those five, there may be more name changes ahead on a phased ba­sis, the EBC hint­ed.

Bound­ary changes were made on the size of the elec­torate based on a for­mu­la the EBC us­es—the elec­torate in any con­stituen­cy shall not be more than 110 per cent nor be less than 90 per cent of the to­tal elec­torate of the is­land di­vid­ed by the num­ber of con­stituen­cies in that is­land.

As such, in any con­stituen­cy, the high­est lim­its for elec­tors are 30,887 in Trinidad and 26,082 in To­ba­go. The low­est lim­its are 25,271 in Trinidad and 23,473 in To­ba­go.

Four con­stituen­cies—To­co/San­gre Grande, D’Abadie/O’Meara, Ca­roni Cen­tral and Cu­mu­to/Man­zanil­la, fall above the per­mis­si­ble up­per lim­it, while five con­stituen­cies—Port-of-Spain North/St Ann’s West, Port-of-Spain South, San Fer­nan­do East, San Fer­nan­do West and Pointe-a-Pierre, fall be­low the per­mis­si­ble low­er lim­it.

The oth­er sev­en con­stituen­cies to be af­fect­ed by bound­ary changes in the nine non-com­pli­ant con­stituen­cies are Ari­ma, La Hor­quet­ta/Tal­paro, Laven­tille East/Mor­vant, Laven­tille West, Oropouche East, Tabaquite and Trinci­ty/Mal­oney.

There­fore, the to­tal ar­eas where bound­ary changes were made—and polling di­vi­sions shift­ed to ad­join­ing con­stituen­cies—are Ca­roni Cen­tral, Tabaquite, Pointe-a-Pierre, Cu­mu­to/Man­zanil­la, La Hor­quet­ta/Tal­paro, D’Abadie/O’Meara, Arou­ca/Mal­oney, Port-of-Spain North/St Ann’s West, Port-of-Spain South, Laven­tille West, Laven­tille East/Mor­vant, San Fer­nan­do East, Oropouche East, San Fer­nan­do West, To­co/San­gre Grande and Ari­ma.