Dionne Rose, Staff Reporter

The Electoral Office of Jamaica (EOJ) is appealing to members of the public to apply to work during elections when they are called. So far, the office is reporting a slow response to its recruitment exercise for election workers, which started more than a month ago.

Takeese Allen, public education officer at the EOJ, told The Gleaner Tuesday that only 1,000 persons had signed up to last Friday. This, she said, is significantly short of the 20,000 workers that are needed.

But in an earlier interview with The Gleaner, Danville Walker, director of elections, had said that recruitment exercise during the summer could prove to be a difficult one as many of those who would volunteer would be teachers.

"Teachers make up about 40 per cent of the electoral workers in an election and during this time (summer), you can't find them," he explained.

Mrs. Allen however pointed out that the EOJ was not yet worried over the numbers as an election has not yet been called so the recruitment exercise can be ongoing until it meets its target.

"We have not yet established a cut-off time. We are not necessarily aggressively recruiting but we are still putting things in order in case an election is called," she said.

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On Monday, the EOJ placed a full-page advertisement in the newspapers encouraging members of the public to sign up as election workers.

In the meantime, Citizens Action for Free and Fair Elections (CAFFE) is also put things in place in case an election is called, said Nancy Anderson, a board member of CAFFE.

She said that the voluntary organisation was currently liaising with parish coordinators and volunteers who worked in the last election. She said CAFFE was also sending out funding proposals to businesspersons to assist in preparing the organisation. This proposal she said is expected to cost more than $20 million.