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dependence in the communities along Mountain View Road to the obvious wealth and independence of
Beverly Hills. This means that the needs of each community are likely to be different. There are only 5
communities that residents descibe as ‘nests’: August Town, Cedar Valley Terrace (Stand Pipe), and
Saunders/Jarret Lane for the PNP; and Hermitage and Hampton Park (Back Bush) for the JLP. The
majority of residents in these areas are expected to vote based on tradition. This explains why only 16%
of respondents from these areas reported that they have no intention of voting in the upcoming
election. However, these ‘traditional’ communities make up only 44% of the constituency’s population.
The majority of the constituency therefore are expected to vote based largely on the performance of the
candidate; and their apathy is relatively high (25%).
15%
15%
13%
13%
10%
10%
9%
9%
6%
Chart 12: Distribution of Households in St. Andrew East
Papine
Mountain View Road
August Town
Mona Heights
Beverly Hills
Hermitage
Hope Pastures
Elletson Flats
Liguanea Sector
Main Reasons PNP and JLP Will and Might Vote
The data displayed in Chart 13 and Chart 14 show that St. Andrew Eastern is very different from the
other marginal seats studied in that there is no majority of traditional votes for the PNP (43%) or JLP
(34). In fact, the PNP only managed to have significantly more of these reliable votes because of the
slightly greater proportion of voters from the ‘nests’discussed above. The data show that the people of
this constituency rewards performance or effort from their candidate. This is the only constituency in
the study in which a candidate is ranked second as a primary reason to vote. While the JLP will benefit
additionally from persons of JLP background wanting to put their party back in power, the PNP will
certainly benefit from having a candidate that is considered exceptional by the voters of the
constituency.