Today is Nomination Day. Any hope that the widely undesired snap election due to the dire post-Irma social conditions could yet be postponed has now gone.
Six parties will submit candidate lists, of which four lacking representation in Parliament must obtain support from one per cent of the most recent valid vote, amounting to 142 voters, on Monday at the former Civil Registry (Census) Office. It concerns the St. Maarten Christian Party (SMCP), the St. Maarten Development Movement (SDM), People’s Progressive Alliance (PPA) and the just formed United Democrats.
The latter regards a combination of United People’s (UP) party and the Democratic Party (DP) that are both currently in the legislature, but it is considered a “new” party which thus still has to qualify for the February 26 poll. SMCP, SDM and PPA all managed it last time around, but because they subsequently failed to earn a seat need to do so again.
National Alliance (NA) and United St. Maarten Party (US Party) don’t have to go through the endorsement process and are already guaranteed their spots on the ballot. They will also be given preference regarding their colours; respectively white and blue.
The others are to choose between the remaining 12 available options of red, yellow, green, brown, cyan, black, purple, magenta, orange, grey, beige and gold. SMCP (brown), SDM (grey) and PPA (orange) probably will ask for the same colours they used in September 2016, while UP had green and DP red.
There are 22,599 eligible voters, 257 more than 17 months ago, when the turnout was 65 per cent. Whether that percentage goes down because voting cards in first instance won’t be mailed as usual, but retrieved in the districts, remains to be seen, although the Postal Service will supposedly handle leftover cards.
The number of votes required for a seat ended up being 947 in 2016 and with a similar turnout should stay about the same. It’s only after making the threshold that parties can vie for so-called residual seats.
This newspaper maintains its position that holding early elections under the present circumstances was a bad idea from the start. Not everyone agrees, some arguing that the next 15 representatives to be chosen can hardly do much worse when it comes to providing the country with political stability and an effective government
Only time will tell.
