(Reuters) – Preliminary results trickled in late on Wednesday from the first general election Barbados has held since becoming a republic last year, with initial returns strongly favoring the Barbados Labor Party (BLP) of Prime Minister Mia Mottley.
The BLP went into the vote holding 29 of the 30 seats in the national legislature, and Mottley was comfortably re-elected in one of the first constituencies to be declared.
Results came in piecemeal overnight and projections broadcast on local television suggested the BLP was headed for a sweeping victory.
Mottley called the snap election in December, saying the vote would help promote unity as the government battled the coronavirus pandemic, which has heavily affected the tourism-focused economy of the Caribbean nation.
About 5,000 people among a population of just under 300,000 were in isolation after being infected, recent official figures show.
The former British colony declared independence in 1966 but retained Queen Elizabeth as its ceremonial head of state until Nov. 30 last year. She was replaced by President Sandra Mason.
(Reporting by Cassandra Garrison; Editing by Howard Goller and Clarence Fernandez)
