Trinidad & Tobago pollster and political scientist Derek Ramsamooj has made it clear that he is not doing any polling for the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) for the September 3 General Election.

In fact, Ramsamooj has said that he is not conducting any surveys in Jamaica at this time.

Ramsamooj was responding to a story in this week’s Sunday Observer which reported a high-ranking JLP official as saying that the pollster was a part of the set-up influencing the governing party’s approach going into the general election.

“The man is playing his role same way,” the JLP senior man had said. “He polled the by-election that involved Mrs [Ann-Marie] Vaz last year [March], and he quietly does work for us.”

However, Ramsamooj told the Sunday Observer last Wednesday that the information given to the newspaper “borders on a lie”.

“It is incorrect to say that I am participating directly or indirectly for the JLP or any other political party,” Ramsamooj said. “This article smacks of dishonesty by whoever the high official is. The official either deliberately chose to misrepresent or, in his or her enthusiasm, misspoke.”

He said the last time he did any political polling in Jamaica was in the run-up to the Portland Eastern parliamentary by-election last year April, which saw the JLP’s Ann-Marie Vaz defeat the People’s National Party’s (PNP) Damion Crawford.

Ramsamooj also challenged the JLP official who spoke to the Sunday Observer to produce any evidence, poll or otherwise, that would demonstrate his participation in the party’s 2020 election campaign.

He also said he was not in Trinidad as reported by the Sunday Observer.

Ramsamooj had won kudos in Jamaica when he revealed less than a week before the February 25, 2016 General Election that the JLP was fancied to beat the then governing PNP, as the JLP was riding a late momentum going into the election.

At the time, Ramsamooj said that marginal seats held the key to victory, and errors committed by either the JLP or PNP could spell disaster for the party making the errors. The poll found that 51.76 per cent of electors would vote for the JLP in 13 marginal seats, and 48.24 per cent would vote for the PNP. At the time, the pollster said that he and his team had interviewed 1,859 people. The poll had a margin of error of plus or minus four per cent.