Doug Wheatley against raising of nomination fee
He was speaking on his weekly Speak Out BVI show aired last night March 10, 2015 on ZBVI 780 AM.
Wheatley said he is not in agreement with any proposal to raise the fees, even though one may argue that the present fee has been in place a long time and needs to be increased. According to him, there is a proposal to increase the nomination fee from $500 to $1000.
He said, however, that he is aware of the reasons why some may agree with the increase, chief among which is to weed out unsuitable persons from entering the political race.
"I did not agree with that statement because I don't think it is for us to say who is frivolous and who is not frivolous and to put up a fee to the point where it would exclude frivolous persons," said Wheatley.
He said once people are eligible to run for elections there should be no further burdens placed on them like increased fees. He said it should be left to the electorate to decide whether or not a particular individual is elected.
"One of the things we have to be careful of is that we don't use every means of getting money as government revenue.
Putting it up to $1,000 the idea should not be to increase revenue as a result," he said.
However, a caller to the show said he is in agreement with the increase. "I think it's a good idea to raise the fees," the caller said.
Another caller said that the fee should be raised to as much as $3,000 to make it out of reach for certain persons whom in his view are unsuitable.
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