Chief Elections Officer ready for Wednesday
In a season of very busy people she has been among the busiest. Today, on election eve, Chief Elections Officer Myrtle Palacio took time out for a few last words to the nation’s voters.
Myrtle Palacio, Chief Elections Officer
“The voter is the most important person in our democracy. In our culture in Belize, we turn out in large numbers to vote and that is how we exercise our rights; other countries, the other ways, that is our political culture. I am urging Belizeans to come out in large numbers as usual and cast your vote. As Chief Elections Officer I would like to say that our elections continue to be free and fair and free from fear, and tomorrow will be no less, no different. I am urging all those who are participating, our stakeholders, to be a part of this and make tomorrow a very successful day.
Tomorrow is different than any other election, mainly because in our municipalities, we will be experiencing double elections. The process is the same; nothing has changed in terms of the process except that we will be repeating it twice. We are trying to set up more booths in the municipal sections to anticipate efficiency in moving electors forward. I am urging electors, as also a stakeholder in this, to ensure that they do not have spoilt ballots, that all their votes are counted.
How can that happen? The first and most important is to ensure that the presiding officer initials the ballot paper. To ensure that particularly in the municipal election they do not vote for more candidates than needed or else they are going to spoil their vote. To count their X’s before leaving the booth, and if they’re spoilt a ballot paper, they can always request a ballot paper. So those two things are very important: to try and align their X’s, their checks to indicate that is the person or persons they want to vote for clearly, to indicate that clearly within the space specified.”
Janelle Chanona
“Now once a voter has done his democratic right and left the polling station and for the rest of us who are going to be waiting on the sidelines for the voting to come in, do you have any idea yet as to when those numbers will start coming in Mrs. Palacio?”
Myrtle Palacio
“That is the media as usual with the numbers. I don’t think it will be any unusual time limit. As you know in Belize, we take all our ballot boxes to one counting station, so we will be counting ballots ranging from two thousand to seven thousand in our general elections, and ranging from three thousand to thirty-two thousand in our municipal elections. For me, where I sit, I would prefer that returning officers and the accounting clerks ensure that there is accuracy and the tallies, we have tally sheets for the split votes, to ensure accuracy. Because it’s the recount really that takes such a long time sometimes. And if we do not really need to recount, then possibly time would be shorter. But we can go all night as far as I’m concerned, as long as all parties are satisfied that the counting is accurate.”
Viewers are reminded that News 5, in conjunction with love Fm, will be providing full all-day-all-night coverage of the voting and counting, beginning at six Wednesday morning.
