Following the April 30 general elections in Antigua and Barbuda, the Organization of American States (OAS) has released a detailed post-election assessment that urges comprehensive overhauls to the nation’s electoral framework, identifying critical gaps across voter registration, campaign finance transparency, gender representation and multiple other core domains. While the OAS Electoral Observation Mission ultimately praised the overall conduct of the 2024 polls as credible and professionally managed, its final report outlines a broad set of systemic weaknesses that require urgent attention to strengthen electoral fairness and public trust.
One of the most pressing issues highlighted by the mission is the inaccuracy and structural imbalance plaguing the country’s voter rolls and constituency boundaries. The current voter registration framework lacks formal protocols to remove the names of deceased citizens or long-term emigrants from the electoral roll, leading to outdated and inflated voter counts. To address this flaw, the OAS recommends establishing cross-institutional data-sharing agreements and introducing a standardized unique national identifier to streamline voter verification and roll maintenance. The mission also flagged stark disparities in constituency size: registered voter populations range from just 1,263 in the St. Philip South constituency to 5,997 in St. George, creating significant inequities in the weight of individual votes across the country. The report notes that long-delayed boundary adjustments stem from outdated national census data, with the last fully completed census conducted more than a decade ago in 2011.
On the technological front, the mission offered mixed feedback: while it commended election officials for the real-time online publication of preliminary election results, it emphasized that the broader vote tabulation process remains heavily reliant on manual processes, creating avoidable inefficiencies and transparency risks. Key recommendations for this area include developing a centralized, fully computerized national results system and publishing scanned copies of official Statements of Polls to enable independent public verification of vote totals.
The report also shines a light on major gaps in campaign finance regulation. Current rules only apply to the short formal election period, which runs from the issuance of the election writ to its return, a timeframe that typically lasts less than one month. This narrow window leaves the vast majority of the political cycle unregulated, allowing political parties and candidates to raise and spend large sums of money without any mandatory public disclosure. Additionally, existing disclosure requirements focus almost exclusively on campaign contributions, with almost no reporting mandated for total expenditures, leaving voters without a full picture of how campaigns are funded. The OAS has called for strengthened national legislation, including binding spending limits, expanded reporting requirements that cover the full electoral cycle, and enhanced oversight powers for the Antigua and Barbuda Electoral Commission (ABEC).
Outdated legal structure also emerged as a key area for reform. The country’s core electoral legislation, the Representation of the People Act (ROPA), was first enacted in 1975 and has been modified through dozens of incremental amendments without ever being fully consolidated. This has left the legal framework fragmented and difficult to interpret for both election officials and the public. The mission is calling for a full, comprehensive revision of the act to improve the clarity and accessibility of electoral law. The report also raised procedural concerns around election dispute resolution: the current seven-day deadline for filing election challenges is far too short for petitioners to gather required evidence, and there are no statutory timelines for resolving disputes once filed, a gap that can lead to months or even years of unresolved political uncertainty.
Perhaps the most striking finding highlighted in the report relates to gender representation. Despite women making up 54.31% of all registered voters and accounting for a large share of on-the-ground election workers, female representation among electoral candidates dropped sharply from the 2023 election cycle. Just 5 out of 37 total candidates, or 13.51%, were women this year, down from 20.75% in 2023. Ultimately, only two women won seats in Parliament, leaving women holding just 11.7% of the national legislative body. The OAS attributes this underrepresentation to deep structural barriers, including limited access to campaign financing for female candidates, male-dominated party hierarchies that discourage women from running for winnable seats, and persistent societal biases. To close this gap, the mission recommends targeted policy interventions, including candidate training programs, mentorship initiatives for emerging female political leaders, and the consideration of formal affirmative action policies to boost female participation.
In its closing conclusions, the mission reaffirmed that Antigua and Barbuda’s April 30 general election met core international standards for credibility, but emphasized that far-reaching reforms are necessary to modernize the electoral system, enhance its fairness, and rebuild public confidence in electoral processes. The OAS has urged national authorities, all registered political parties, and civil society organizations to work collaboratively to implement these recommended changes ahead of the nation’s next electoral cycle.
