KAY-MARIE FLETCH­ER

Se­nior Re­porter

kay-marie.fletch­er@guardian.com

Sev­er­al Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) elec­tion can­di­dates left the Elec­tions and Bound­aries Com­mis­sion (EBC) head­quar­ters in Port-of-Spain dis­ap­point­ed yes­ter­day, af­ter their re­quest to have two re­turn­ing of­fi­cers re­moved was dis­missed by Chief Elec­tion Of­fi­cer Fern Nar­cis and her team.

Fol­low­ing the nom­i­na­tion process on Fri­day, the UNC had claimed that the con­duct of two re­turn­ing of­fi­cers were ques­tion­able and could have pos­si­bly af­fect­ed the fair­ness of the nom­i­na­tion process.

Ac­cord­ing to UNC, one re­turn­ing of­fi­cer’s re­quire­ments for the par­ty’s Ch­agua­nas East can­di­date, Van­dana Mo­hit, were ir­reg­u­lar and bur­den­some com­pared to the de­mands for oth­er can­di­dates.

Ad­di­tion­al­ly, the UNC claimed an­oth­er re­turn­ing of­fi­cer in Tu­na­puna omit­ted Tu­na­puna can­di­date Roger Alexan­der’s name from the re­ceipt of his nom­i­na­tion de­posit, an ac­tion that could have led to his nom­i­na­tion be­ing de­clared in­valid.

As such, the par­ty re­quest­ed the of­fi­cers be re­moved or dis­ci­plined. How­ev­er, the UNC said to their sur­prise, the EBC said that was not in their ju­ris­dic­tion.

Speak­ing to Guardian Me­dia fol­low­ing the meet­ing out­side EBC, UNC chair­man and Oropouche West can­di­date Dav­en­dranath Tan­coo said they were star­tled to learn the EBC had no pow­er to re­move its of­fi­cers.

Tan­coo said, “There was a star­tling and con­cern­ing sit­u­a­tion where the EBC ad­vised us they were not in a po­si­tion to dis­ci­pline, con­trol or even re­move a pre­sid­ing of­fi­cer where we raised is­sues.”

Ef­forts to con­tact Nar­cis for com­ment were un­suc­cess­ful as she did not an­swer her cell­phone.