Op­po­si­tion Leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar has al­leged “col­lu­sion” be­tween the Elec­tions and Bound­aries Com­mis­sion (EBC) and the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM), crit­i­cis­ing the EBC’s fail­ure to up­date the vot­er list across all 41 con­stituen­cies through its na­tion­al field ver­i­fi­ca­tion ex­er­cise.

On Tues­day, the EBC, head­ed by Fern Nar­cis-Scope, in­formed Guardian Me­dia that it aimed to com­plete 23 con­stituen­cies by ear­ly next year. To date, 14 con­stituen­cies have been com­plet­ed, while sev­en are ap­prox­i­mate­ly 80 per cent com­plete, and the re­main­ing two are be­tween 50 per cent and 80 per cent fin­ished.

The EBC cit­ed sev­er­al chal­lenges hin­der­ing the process, in­clud­ing dif­fi­cul­ties se­cur­ing fund­ing from the Min­istry of Fi­nance, re­cruit­ing staff to work in high-risk ar­eas, reach­ing in­di­vid­u­als to con­firm their reg­is­tra­tion de­tails, and over­com­ing hes­i­tan­cy from res­i­dents to en­gage with field in­ves­ti­ga­tors. Ad­di­tion­al­ly, the labour-in­ten­sive task of ver­i­fy­ing sur­vey da­ta has added to de­lays.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar yes­ter­day ques­tioned why the nec­es­sary fund­ing was not pro­vid­ed.

“The Gov­ern­ment is re­spon­si­ble to pro­vide fund­ing to the EBC to con­duct free and fair elec­tions in a trans­par­ent democ­ra­cy. From what the EBC is say­ing, that’s not hap­pen­ing,” she re­marked.

Fi­nance Min­is­ter Colm Im­bert, how­ev­er, coun­tered these claims. In an email re­sponse to Guardian Me­dia on Tues­day, Im­bert stat­ed that funds were ap­proved as part of the 2024 Bud­get to fa­cil­i­tate the field ver­i­fi­ca­tion ex­er­cise. He at­trib­uted de­lays to the un­fore­seen tim­ing of the lo­cal gov­ern­ment elec­tions, which dis­rupt­ed fi­nan­cial plan­ning for the ex­er­cise.

De­spite this, Per­sad-Bisses­sar ac­cused Gov­ern­ment of lever­ag­ing the de­lays to or­ches­trate a broad­er con­spir­a­cy aimed at se­cur­ing the PNM’s re­turn to pow­er.

“And the col­lu­sion is this, the Gov­ern­ment is push­ing for cer­tain hous­ing projects to be com­plet­ed AS­AP, rapid­ly, and is there­fore a plan, a con­spir­a­cy that they want to pop­u­late those hous­es be­fore com­plet­ing the vot­er’s list. And I would ask the prime min­is­ter to come clean on that,” she al­leged.

She al­so ridiculed Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley’s com­ments in Par­lia­ment on Mon­day, where he called for a “clean list” of vot­ers, point­ing out that the EBC leg­isla­tive­ly falls un­der the Prime Min­is­ter’s Of­fice.

“He wants a clean list too, but you are in charge,” she said.

“You knew this elec­tion was com­ing how long ago? We know the elec­tion was due this 2025. Why is it now we’re go­ing to have, what, 18 con­stituen­cies that are not go­ing to have that field sur­vey done? I am very con­cerned,” she added.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar fur­ther ac­cused Gov­ern­ment of at­tempt­ing to pop­u­late hous­ing de­vel­op­ments with PNM sup­port­ers to bol­ster their chances in con­stituen­cies cur­rent­ly held by the op­po­si­tion.

She al­so called for in­ter­na­tion­al ob­servers to mon­i­tor the elec­tions due next year.

Al­though the Prime Min­is­ter as­sured dur­ing Mon­day’s Par­lia­men­tary ses­sion that Cari­com ob­servers would be in­vit­ed, Per­sad-Bisses­sar in­sist­ed that ob­servers from oth­er or­gan­i­sa­tions, in­clud­ing the Unit­ed Na­tions, Com­mon­wealth Par­lia­men­tary As­so­ci­a­tion, and Eu­ro­pean Union, should al­so be in­clud­ed.

“I am not over­ly con­vinced that hav­ing Cari­com ob­servers alone is suf­fi­cient, and I call to the PM again to re­con­sid­er and in­vite in­ter­na­tion­al ob­servers. This is a very im­por­tant elec­tion, and it be­comes even more im­por­tant based on what the EBC is now telling us about the field sur­vey,” she stat­ed.