Golding
Angelo Laurence, Gleaner Writer
MANDEVILLE:
CHAIRMAN OF the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP), Senator Bruce Golding, who is now in a battle with Northwest Clarendon member of Parliament, Pearnel Charles to become the party's next leader after Edward Seaga steps down, is calling for sweeping changes in the way government operates.
Golding, who was speaking at the Northern Caribbean University (NCU) along with the People's National Party's Paul Burke, called for more participation by the people in the running of the government and declared that a "way must be found to take the government to the people."
Both Golding and Burke were presenters at the university's W.D. Carter Library public lecture series, 'Ensuring Democratic Commitment 60 Years After Adult Suffrage'.
POWER SPEECH
While the sometimes fiery Paul Burke sounded much like Bruce Golding, it was the JLP's chairman whose message of less government power and more people power that ignited the approximately two hundred persons in attendance.
Claiming that he would like his legacy to be an educated population when he leaves politics, he pointed out that those nations with a highly educated population are the more prosperous. He said, "not even bad government can stop the people" when they are educated. Golding was quick to say however that government should not be expected to accept "responsibility for food, shelter and clothing" but to provide the environment whereby the people can determine their own fate.
MAJOR OVERHAUL
For Jamaica to ensure its commitment to democracy, the people, he said, "must first and foremost take ownership of that democracy" and be responsible for it, becoming anxious to see that it works. Declaring that the prime minister of Jamaica has more powers than United States President George Bush, the JLP chairman said that our system of democracy needs a major overhaul.
According to Mr. Golding, Jamaica needs a constitution which sets out clearly the powers of those who govern with the people deciding how that power should be used. He scoffed at the present constitution, which he says allows the government to institute laws to suit its own agenda and change those it does not like. Due to this, he said, when representatives run afoul or they are "overwhelmed with youthful exuberance" they rarely resign and when they do they, "threaten to return" and return they do.
