BLACK RIVER, St Elizabeth – Representatives of the two major political parties in South West St Elizabeth have condemned a missile-throwing clash between party supporters which led to the smashing of a journalist’s car outside the Electoral Office in Black River on Wednesday night during the vote count for the local government elections.

The right rear window of a car belonging to Rayon Dyer, news correspondent for the Gleaner newspaper, was smashed and the right side of the vehicle dented by stones and bottles as supporters of the ruling Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) and the Opposition People’s National Party (PNP) clashed at about 7:30 pm.

The Black River police said they fired shots in the air to disperse the large crowd of partisan supporters. There were no reports of injuries.

Late yesterday, Christopher Tufton, the JLP’s member of parliament for SW St Elizabeth – who claimed that the car of a JLP party worker was also damaged in the fracas – and the PNP’s Mordant Mitchell, the winner in the Black River Division, condemned the incident.

“I condemn any kind of violence, political or otherwise,” said Mitchell, who according to the preliminary results defeated the JLP’s Damion Baker 1,698 to 1,545. “Supporters who have been around me. know that I don’t accept boisterous or aggressive behaviour much less the throwing of stones,” added Mitchell.

And while insisting that the JLP does not “condone any form of violence” Tufton said the violence which had led to damage to Dyer’s car as well as damage to the windscreen of a vehicle belonging to a JLP activist was a “continuation of a trend” which had resulted in serious injury to another JLP worker on the night of the parliamentary elections on September 3. At that time the injured JLP worker, whose throat was slashed, had to spend a week in hospital, Tufton said.

Tufton suggested yesterday that the counting of votes at the electoral office in Black River was ill-advised since it was too close to the PNP’s constituency office. The MP said that leading up to the elections he had questioned the decision to count at the Electoral Office, rather than the courthouse which has been the venue in previous years. He was told that the courthouse was unavailable because of court sessions, Tufton said.

Preliminary results yesterday showed the JLP retaining control of the St Elizabeth Parish Council, 8-7 down from 9-6 in the previous council.

Following it’s narrow victory in the September 3 poll, the JLP won a majority in nine of Jamaica’s 13 parish councils