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OAS Permanent Council Received Report of the Electoral Mission to the General Elections in Saint Kitts and Nevis

The Permanent Council of the Organization of American States (OAS) today received the verbal report of the Electoral Observation Mission (EOM) that the institution sent to the general elections in Saint Kitts and Nevis on February 16, which highlighted the high turnout and good civic behavior of the citizens of the Caribbean country.

The Chief of the Electoral Observation Mission (EOM), United States diplomat Frank Almaguer, who was appointed by the OAS Secretary General, José Miguel Insulza, congratulated the citizens of the Federation of Saint Kitts and Nevis for their "peaceful” participation and “high voter turnout" in the elections, which resulted in the victory of Prime Minister Timothy Harris and the coalition of parties he led, "Team Unity."

Among its recommendations, the report acknowledges the political will among all political parties regarding the need to realign constituency boundaries "in order to guarantee a more equal representation of the electorate, as required by law." The report also suggests that, in future electoral processes, electoral authorities implement a timely communication strategy to inform all stakeholders about early voting procedures, including the handling of ballot boxes on election night. It also notes that during the pre-election period the list of voters should be published with sufficient time before election day, as prescribed by law, and mentions that the EOM received several complaints about the delay in the publication of the list.

Moreover, the report indicates that the EOM team, which consisted of eleven experts and observers, heard concerns regarding the lack of legislative regulation of political party campaign finances.

The report also reflects the complaint of representatives of the opposition and civil society that public television did not provide equitable coverage to the opposition campaign. In this context, the report recalls that this observation was also made by the EOM that witnessed the 2010 elections.

Moreover, while the high participation of women in political parties was noted, both at the grassroots level and in leadership; it also emphasized that only one woman out of 22 candidates was nominated for the 2015 general elections.

For his part, the Alternate Representative of Saint Kitts and Nevis, Justin Hawley, thanked Secretary General Insulza, Ambassador Almaguer and the OAS Department for Electoral Cooperation and Observation (DECO) for their support of democracy in his country. The Caribbean diplomat also said that his government is committed to "review, examine and implement" the recommendations of the EOM report.

A gallery of photos of the event is available here.

The video news of the event will be available here.

For more information, please visit the OAS Website at www.oas.org.

Reference: E-167/15