More than 440,000 voted in Monday's election

The Guardian newspaper reported Friday that 43.12 per cent of the electorate voted in Monday's Local Government Election, citing an official of the Elections and Boundaries Commission (EBC).

That's the highest ever voter turnout for a local election, with 448,022 people voting, according to a report on CNC3 television. 

The result shows the Opposition People’s National Movement (PNM) won eight corporations to the People’s Partnership’s (PP). Chaguanas is undecided. 

The new Independent Liberal Party (ILP) of Jack Warner won some seats and will get some aldermen because of the Proportional Representation system introduced in 2013 for the first time. But it did not win any corporation.

In 2010, the People's Partnership won 11 of the 14 corporations with the PNM getting the other three. The opposition party reversed that in 2013 taking control of Port of Spain, San Fernando, Point Fortin, Diego Martin, Arima, San Juan-Laventille, Sangre Grande and Tunapuna.

The United National Congress (UNC) won the five seats in its south/central heartland - Rio Claro, Couva, Princes Town, Siparia and Penal.

Under the PR system, the EBC would allocated four aldermen for each corporation based on the number of votes cast. It has not yet calculated how the 56 aldermen would be allocated. However some media reports say according to the unofficial tally the PNM would get 30 aldermen, the UNC 13, 10 for the ILP and 3 for the COP.

Although both the PNM and ILP voted against the measure, they will benefit from it since the system corrects anomalies in the first past the post system which is designed on a winner take all basis. In the PR model every votes counts.  The PP government introduced it because it is a more democratic system.

The ILP took thousands of votes from the UNC, which PP officials said contributed to the party's loss in key corporations.