Independent candidate Gregor Nassief has called on the Electoral Commission to repair the country's electoral system before the next general election, pointing to a two-year suspension of voter transfers that he says has effectively suspended voters' democratic right.
Nassief made his criticisms at a media event held on Friday. He said the freeze on voter transfers has left citizens unable to move their registration in the way they would normally be entitled to, and he argued that the situation undermines the basic principle that every eligible voter should be able to take part in elections. His remarks were directed at the Electoral Commission, the body responsible for the administration of elections in Dominica.
Nassief also raised a number of other electoral issues during the event. The reporting available does not provide a full list of these concerns, and the excerpt from Dominica News Online on which this account draws is incomplete, so the wider substance of his criticisms cannot be fully set out here. What is clear is that he framed the problems as matters that needed to be addressed well ahead of the next general election rather than in the final weeks before polling.
The central point of his appeal is timing. By calling for the system to be fixed before the next general election, Nassief is asking the Commission to act while there is still room to correct the register and give voters a fair opportunity to update their details. Electoral arrangements are a sensitive subject in Dominica, where confidence in the voter register and in the ability of every eligible citizen to vote directly shapes public trust in elections.
It is not yet clear how many voters are affected by the transfer freeze. Nor is it established whether the suspension is a formal, documented decision or a de facto situation that has arisen in practice over the past two years. Those questions are central to understanding the scale of the problem, and they cannot be answered from the material currently available.
The reporting does not record a response from the Electoral Commission to Nassief's criticisms, and no comment from the Commission has been published in the material reviewed. Until the Commission explains the cause and expected duration of the freeze, residents who have moved within the country or who wish to change their polling arrangements will have limited information about how the transfer process currently works and when it may resume.
Dominica News Online has reported Nassief's remarks as the candidate's own position. The account therefore reflects his claims rather than an independently verified assessment of the register, and further detail from the Commission would be needed to confirm the scope, cause and effect of the freeze on voters across the island.
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