Barbados Election: Democratic Labour Party wins. "It's time for change"

It's about 1.30 in the morning and the overall results are in. Owen Arthur and the Barbados Labour Party will not have a fourth consecutive term, and the new prime minister designate is David Thompson, whose Democratic Labour Party won an impressive victory looking set to have 20 seats. There will be at least one recount, but the overall result will not change. Several Cabinet ministers lost their seats, including Clyde Mascoll and Noel Lynch. The outgoing PM was understandably not his usual voluble personality when just interviewed on the radio. Clearly DLP MPs, candidates, and supporters are of course jubilant. The turnout seems to have been good, around 64 percent.

At first blush, it looks as if Peter Wickham and his CADRES poll got the call more or less correct in terms of swing and possible seats for DLP (see previous post). Peter Boxill, who conducted a competing CHAPO/Boxill poll was clearly uncomfortable in the TV studio as the results came in and his poll, which had indicated a BLP win, seemed to take on more and more unreality.

More details tomorrow.