2005 Dominican general election
General elections were held in Dominica on 5 May 2005. The result was a victory for the ruling Dominica Labour Party, which won 12 of the 21 seats in the House of Assembly. The opposition United Workers' Party unsuccessfully made legal challenges to several of the constituency results.
Background
In the previous 2000 elections the ruling United Workers' Party won one fewer seats than the Dominica Labour Party, despite receiving more votes. As a result, the Dominica Labour Party with 10 seats was able to form a coalition government with the Dominica Freedom Party, which had won two seats. In 2004, Prime Minister Pierre Charles died and was succeeded by Minister of Education Roosevelt Skerrit.Campaign
On 7 April Skerrit announced that the elections would take place on 5 May. Altogether 47 candidates stood in the elections; 21 candidates from the United Workers' Party, 19 from the Dominica Labour Party, 3 from the Dominica Progressive Party, 2 from the Dominica Freedom Party and 2 independents. Just under 66,000 voters were registered to vote in the election at 249 polling stations spread over the 21 constituencies.Major elections issues included an International Monetary Fund austerity economic plan for Dominica and the Dominica Labour Party government's decision to switch recognition from the Republic of China to the People's Republic of China.
On the Monday before the election, there was an incident when motorcades for the two main parties collided with each other. No major injuries resulted and rallies for each party were held afterwards. The police then refused either party permission to hold motorcades on the day before the election.
The campaign was judged as being particularly long and divisive, with the election seen as very close and likely to come down to voter turnout.