The Long, Long List of Phantom Voters

Files showing the stacking of a single residence with phantom voters are in circulation. It is an issue that keeps popping up in constituencies all over.  The key purpose of the recent re-registration exercise was to clean up the voter’s list, but leaked documents show that the trend of phantom voters continues. One of the first cases we reported was one Kelly Street, the Chon Saan Restaurant in the Caribbean Shores Division, where some twelve persons including Deputy Police Commissioner Edward Broaster, are registered.  Today, several other glaring cases popped up.  At the Albert Day Care Centre, at number fifty-six Regent Street, some fifty persons with different surnames are registered. At number fifty-three Kelly Street, some thirty-one persons with different surnames are registered. At fifty-seven Southern Foreshore, twenty-three persons are registered. The latter is a commercial building in the Albert Division. It is the property of Julius Espat and rented by Attorney Herbert Panton, husband of Area Representative Tracy Taegar-Panton. Espat told News Five that it is not possible for twenty-three persons to be residing at that address.

Julius Espat

Julius Espat, Deputy Party Leader, P.U.P.

“I don’t know how so many people can be registered there when it is commercial property at the bottom and there is only one person who is renting. There are three spots in the building, one is vacant, one has a person renting which has a month ago and the other is an attorney. But defienlty twenty three persons do not reside there. It is a problem that the country faces. The truth is that historically both political parties have done it. The truth is that it is done in Belize City mostly because the constituencies are fairly small. It is wrong. It is illegal. The problem you have is that the law is too vague and very difficult to get someone off the list one the scrutiny is not properly done. All Elections and Boundaries require is that when you reach the residence is that someone gets up and says that you live there. It shows that there is a flaw in the system. We spent all this money going through re-registration and we are going right back to where we were at square one. It has to be addressed.”