Can dead voters win elections?

Jerome Teelucksingh

IT’S OFTEN a strange twist of fate when history repeats itself. Issues include bribery in elections, nationality of candidates, and deceased people on the voting list for general elections.

On electoral platforms, prior to the 1925 election, some fears were expressed by labour candidates concerning bribery. One of the meetings, to endorse Capt Arthur Cipriani, was held at the Princes Building (in Port of Spain) on August 7, 1924. Howard-Bishop, a speaker at the meeting, warned the audience to beware of people offering them money ($5 or $10), a drink or trip in a car to vote for a candidate other than Cipriani.

The editorial in the Labour Leader, newspaper of the Trinidad Workingmen’s Association (TWA), was entitled “Bribery at the Elections.” It warned the electorate that it is illegal for candidates to pay to transport voters to the polls. Furthermore, as in England, anyone guilty of bribery was permanently stripped of all electoral privileges.

The view of the TWA was that the penalties for bribery in the colony were not a deterrent. “The penalties locally attaching to this nefarious practice might, at first sight, to the casual observer appear rather heavy; but when on reflection a correct estimate is put upon what might be the result of the law dealing lightly with this aspect of popular government, then the law on the point of Trinidad is far from being what it should be.”

During the weeks prior to the 1933 election, concerns were raised as to the conduct of the campaign in Victoria. On January 20, the Trinidad Guardian published an article with the bold headline: “100 DEAD PEOPLE ON A VOTERS’ LIST.” The article claimed that election agents in Victoria indicated that there were names of at least 100 dead people on the final voting list. An example was Buen Intente Road, in Savana Grande Ward, in which four of the 33 voters were dead.

Almost a week later, that newspaper’s editorial, entitled “Dead and Nearly Dead Voters,” mentioned the “intense surprise” among the public on hearing about deceased voters on the electoral list. Furthermore, election agents indicated that 500 people, qualified to vote in Victoria, were not registered and that the mandatory house-to-house inquiry, in preparation for the 1933 election, was not conducted by the registration officers.

This troubling aspect of political history was repeated. During the 1970s there were reports of dead people voting in the TT elections. Later, in the election of 2000, there was evidence that dead people had voted. It seemed that allegations and actual incidents of electoral fraud were normal during the election season.

Interestingly, in December 2024 the Elections and Boundaries Commission (EBC), in preparation for the 2025 general election, assured the public, “Some names of deceased individuals may remain on the list due to the publication cut-off date.”

Citizenship was also an election issue. During the general election in 2000, members of the PNM expressed concern that two elected MPs from the United National Congress (UNC), William Chaitan and Winston “Gypsy” Peters, should be disqualified from being elected to the House of Representatives. Both Chaitan and Peters were accused of possessing dual citizenship and thereby ineligible to contest the elections.

A similar situation had occurred in the campaign of the 1925 election, when the issue of the nationality of candidates was hotly debated. In September 1924, at an electoral meeting, Cipriani questioned whether Major Randolph Rust could truly represent the national spirit because he was not a Trinidadian: “…even if Major Rust did actually give us all the representation that could be given, when Major Rust is dead and gone 10 or 20 years hence, the local enemies of representative government, the Colonial Office, and our Masters in Downing Street, will make use of it against us.”

In 1925 at a public meeting in Woodbrook, in support of Rust (candidate for Port of Spain), the question of citizenship, pertaining to the ability of an Englishman or foreigner to successfully serve the interests of the people, was addressed.

The chairman, CG Archibald, emphasised the absurdity in attempting to establish the principle that any person born outside of Trinidad should be debarred from being elected to the Legislative Council. Archibald added that the electorate should consider the fact that Major Rust had lived in Trinidad for 43 years.

Rust was born in Somerset, England, and arrived in Trinidad in 1881, where he spent the rest of his life.