ROSEAU, Dominica – The main opposition United Workers Party (UWP), which was swept aside in last Friday’s general election by the ruling Dominica Labour Party (DLP) has announced its intention to challenge the outcome of the results in the High Court.
UWP leader, Lennox Linton, one of three party members to win seats in the elections that the DLP won by an 18-3 margin, said the party will also be going to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) as it condemned the use of teargas by law enforcement authorities to clear the main road that had been blocked by protesters in the western village of Salisbury on the eve of the general election.
Addressing a thank you rally of the UWP here on Thursday night, Linton said lawyers had already been engaged in putting the party’s position to be used to challenge the results of the elections that four regional and international election observer teams including those from the Organisation of American States (OAS) and the Commonwealth said reflected the will of the people and had been free and fair.
“We are going to court with this matter. We have not had much success in the courts over the years but that is neither here nor there. It is a tool that we have that we will continue to use because our contention is that things went wrong and those things that went wrong must be set right.
“One of the plans on which we are moving forward is a court challenge and we are in the process now of assembling the evidence working with our legal team, but our struggle, our protest action for rights in Dominica must continue,” Linton told supporters.
“The protest is very simple, electoral reform and fresh elections,” he said, insisting nonetheless that the three seats won by the party in the elections were done so free and fair and within the constitutional laws of the island.
He said the three elected UWP candidates would take their seats in the 21-member Parliament when it convenes following the general election.
“And so we don’t recognise the government of Dominica, but we contested the elections within the requirements of the Constitution of the laws of Dominica and those of us who were returned successfully will exercise the option of taking our seats in the Parliament of Dominica because we not going to stay out of the Parliament of Dominica which is why we need electoral reform and fresh elections so we have legitimate members of the Parliament on both sides.
“So we are going to Parliament and we are hoping that our protest and our fight will continue on all fronts and one of the fronts will be the Parliament of Dominica,” he added.
The UWP had been calling for electoral reform including the use of identification cards and the cleansing of the electoral list prior to the election. Party activists had failed in their attempt to postpone the elections to February 5 next year after the Court of Appeal upheld a High Court ruling that it had no jurisdiction to hear the matter.
Linton said that the UWP would also be going to the Hague-based ICJ to challenge a decision by the Barbados-based Regional Security System (RSS) to send law enforcement officials here prior to the elections and their involvement in a police exercise to use teargas in Salisbury.
“We have to commit ourselves that this atrocity in Salisbury that took place on the morning before the election has to be dealt with. They will not have a commission of inquiry (but) we will have our people’s commission of inquiry…and we will gather the evidence and we will find a way to find our way before the International Court of Justice at the Hague because crimes against humanity must be prosecuted and punished.
“Tear gas in sleeping people in their beds on the morning before elections that is not going to go like that. I am asking all of you to make your preparations now and join us in Salisbury for a massive solidarity thank you….and a candle light vigil where we will pray,” he told supporters. (CMC)