Martin Henry
Martin Henry
THE ASSAMBA samba before the party faithful has led to indecent public exposure. Political parties will do anything they can get away with to win or retain power. And I am not just talking about Jamaican political parties. There is an ugly underside to political parties everywhere they operate and that is everywhere that competitive democratic politics is practised. The parties themselves are anything but democratic, open and tolerant of diverse views. They are war machines for the capture of state power, willing to varying degrees to inflict collateral damage and to commit atrocities in combat.
Assamba's ministerial colleague occupying one of the most secure parliamentary seats in the country and the high office of Minister of Finance earlier made his own indecent exposure by declaring to the party faithful that budgetary constraints had been relaxed to accommodate pre-election spending to assist the party's re-election. Any collateral damage to the economy was secondary to the party's re-election agenda. The howls of indignation by the Opposition party is sheer hypocrisy. They've been there, done that. And will again.
UNFAIR ADVANTAGE
The main concern is unfair advantage. Breaking ranks even for the highest personal ideals of integrity and conscience is tantamount to being a mortal sin and treason. Look at the Information spokesman tying himself into knots to find nothing wrong with the admission of deliberately packing "independent" civic committees with party members. Look at the political persecution of Minister Simpson Miller by her dear colleagues for refusing to vote against the Opposition parliamentary motion on the poor financing of the fire service which falls under her portfolio.
Again there is nothing peculiarly Jamaican about this. Everywhere in parliaments party whips are given the job of keeping the votes in line with the party line. So much for democracy and a diversity of views among the people's representatives locked down in political parties. But the lockdown is merely a brute necessity of party function. Things can hardly be otherwise. If a political party is to survive, win and hold power it
simply has to be tightly co-
herent, and completely, indeed fanatically devoted to a narrow set of 'winning' ideas. A 'democratic' party quickly flies apart and is relegated to the political wilderness. But whose ideas? The leader's ideas, initiated or endorsed. To an extraordinary degree a political party is a device which harnesses the energies of the many to get one person elected to rule, in place of the older arrangement of the hereditary appointment of monarchs.
Mr. Seaga's 'One Don' label as leader of the JLP is not nearly as unusual as may be thought. The label is merely identifying style, not substance. Who in the PNP could seriously oppose a position endorsed by the party president especially now wielding the power of Prime Minister? In which political party anywhere could this happen for long and the leader remains in place and the party remains a winning fighting machine? The usual is a fawning deference to the wishes of the maximum leader.
Leadership races are now on in earnest in the two major political parties in Jamaica. I have a deep gut fear. The polls are showing a virtual dead heat in popular support for both parties. The coming very close contest is shrouded in the 'fog of war'.
HIGH AND SELFLESS IDEALS
As contender for JLP leadership, Bruce Golding will tell you, the lofty ideals of changing the system cannot be politically achieved from outside the parliament and the system. You have to get elected by the system first. The party delegates who clapped Aloun Assamba and Omar Davies for doing the 'right' thing in the interest of the party and booed Portia Simpson Miller for doing the 'wrong' thing, and their counterparts in the JLP, are not going to elect any Mr. Nice Guy or Miss Nice Lady with high and selfless ideals for seeking the national interest above party interest.
A large number of perhaps naive non-party Jamaicans had thought that the election of P.J. Patterson to the presidency of the PNP was such a lofty move only to be severely disappointed. The party faithful, I have the best of reasons to fear, are going to elect to leadership their toughest fighters who, in the heat and fog of a closely fought contest, will have to have the heart of an angel and a will of steel not to revert to the old politics of Michael Manley and Edward Seaga.
The push from below for victory by any means and for the spoils of victory will be tremendous. Resistance and softness on the part of the leader could see his/her replacement - by any means. The future could be the past.
Martin Henry is a communication specialist.