People applying now to register to vote will not be eligible to cast their ballots in the port referendum to be held later this year, but will be able to take part in the 2025 general election.
The Elections Office confirmed that only the people who have registered before the 1 July deadline will be eligible to vote in the port referendum when it is triggered this year.
“Should the referendum be held between October 1, 2024 and January 1, 2025 the Official List for October 1, 2024 will be the list used. Unfortunately, persons applying before the next deadline which is October 1, 2024 will not be Officially registered until January 1, 2025,” the Elections Office said, in an emailed response to Cayman Compass queries.
The referendum, announced late last month, has been received with mixed reactions as voters on different sides of the issue say more information is needed.
Date to be confirmed
The revised electoral roll has 23,529 registered voters which is expected to become official when the new list is published on 1 Oct., an increase of 65 voters over the last official roll posted 1 July.
Tourism Minister Kenneth Bryan, in an interview last week with the Compass, indicated that the official date for the referendum has not been finalised, but it would be held either at the end of October or mid-November.
However, apart from the announcement of the referendum being held at the end of the year, the Elections Office had no details on the looming vote, but said it would be able to mobilise for both the referendum and the 2025 general election without issue even though they could be only months apart.
The office is working with a 16 April 2025 date for the general election, based on the 2021 polls, and has begun discussions pertaining to both votes.
“We have just under 300 staff members, this consists of Returning, Deputy and Presiding Officers, Poll and Field Clerk,” it said, adding that the official election training is yet to commence.
The public will be notified when applications would be accepted for postal and mobile voting for the referendum, the office said.
Voters cannot yet submit postal and mobile applications for the vote, but “once a date has been announced a schedule of events [will be] followed in accordance with [the] Elections Act (2022) Revision.” The public will then be notified when applications for postal and mobile voting will be accepted.
Hew: Pier needed for cruise
Meanwhile, newly anointed Progressives leader Joey Hew, who will lead the party into the general election, said that his position, as well as that of the party, has always been clear when it comes to cruise berthing.
“If we are going to stay in cruise tourism, we need at least one pier. If we’re not going to stay in cruise tourism, we need to recognise that and we need to ensure that we transition our Caymanian people that rely on cruise tourism either into other occupations or to assist them to transition to be more reliant on stayover tourism,” he told the Compass on Saturday.
He said transitioning Caymanians towards stayover tourists would be facilitated with the new hotels, AirBnBs and guesthouses that have accounted for a large amount of the growth in that visitor category.
“We see tourism continuing to grow and so if we can help them pivot from relying on cruise tourism to more stayover tourism, then that’s a possibility. But the decision has to be made when you’ve taken all things into consideration,” he said.
Questions need to be answered as to how many Caymanians are making a living from cruise tourism, Hew said, and “whether or not that is something that we can continue to support them with, or do we need to pivot them in to other areas of tourism?”
Bryan, in explaining the thinking behind the referendum, said the purpose is to seek a “directive” from the electorate, and is not backed by any proposed plan to introduce piers.
He said the exact wording of the referendum question is being drafted through the Elections Office and the government’s legal team, and will be a simple and straightforward question on whether or not to build a cruise pier.
Bryan said the government is adopting a neutral position on the referendum, but he wants the community to consider all sides and the implications of their vote.
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