Delroy Chuck
THE EUPHORIA surrounding the election of Portia Simpson Miller to the presidency of the PNP and Prime Minister-designate is an interesting commentary on the culture and perception of our people. To be sure, Portia represents something new - new and different from the university intellectuals and male-dominated PNP leadership. She is seen as caring, compassionate and charismatic, and she is. But, what is really new about the leadership of Portia who has been part and parcel of the PNP hierarchy for over 30 years?
Portia is a most likeable politician. She exudes a sympa-thetic air, a thoughtful concern, and tries hard to be on good terms with the weak and strong, the poor and rich, and the high and low in our socially divided society. In all my short discourses with Portia, I have always found a warm and gracious ear. She represents the best charismatic leadership that every politician should have. But, I always wonder if her quality of leadership is enough to extricate the country from the descending spiral of hopelessness and frustration into which her party has taken us.
MAKING A FRESH START
If Portia is to succeed, she has to cut and disengage from the present rudderless and fruitless leadership of her party. She has to make a fresh start, with new social and economic policies, with a determined drive to excise the corruption and waste of most government contracts, with a new approach to control the escalating crime and violence and, most importantly, a new momentum to position her government as the servant instead of the master of the people. If she chooses more than half the present Cabinet ministers, we will know she is not really interested in change and a new beginning but, evidently, it will just be more of the same.
Then, again, Portia may succeed and Jamaica fails, which is the story of the PNP leadership over the decades. The popular and charismatic leadership of Michael Manley was a disaster for Jamaica. Just like Portia, Michael was not only likeable but had the ability to inspire people to work for a common purpose, yet he squan-dered his political capital in failed socialist adventures.
Shrewdly, he changed political course and won another election in 1989 but, once again, never made use of another opportunity to take Jamaica to the Promised Land. Can Portia's charismatic leadership take Jamaica forward with a new vibrancy and vision for a better Jamaica?
STRONG, INSPIRED LEADERSHIP
What Jamaica needs now are truthful revelations of the unpleasant facts, the impending sacrifices and the unveiling of the hard, rocky, road ahead. Jamaica needs strong, visionary and inspired leadership to lift and motivate our people to care for each other, for community and for country. Jamaica is tired of talk, promises and pronouncements - it wants unselfish leadership that puts country above and before party and selfish concerns. Nothing exemplifies what Jamaica needs more than the resounding exhortation of the U.S. President, John F. Kennedy, in his inaugural address, when he urged: "And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you - ask what you can do for your country."
So, does Portia have the strength and guts to tell the Jamaican people there are no more free lunches, no more handouts and something for nothing, no more dependency on Government for everything from the womb to the tomb, and that it is the responsibility of every sane and healthy Jamaican to create surpluses of everything for himself, his family and his country?
If Jamaica is to succeed, Portia must be prepared to use her political capital to offer the country the strong, no-nonsense, leadership it needs. She must be prepared to take the hard decisions, which means telling the people that we cannot continue indefinitely to borrow and live off the surpluses created by others but that Jamaica has to work and earn its way in the global economy. If Jamaica is to succeed, it needs more than caring and charismatic leadership, it needs leadership prepared to unveil the hard reality of where we are, where we want to go and how to get there. Is Portia really up to the task?
Delroy Chuck is an attorney-at-law and Member of Parliament. He can be contacted by email at delchuck@hotmail.com.
