Delroy Chuck
FROM ALL INDICATIONS, there will be general elections this year. Constitutionally, it can be delayed up to early 1908. However, the governing PNP government is in a quandary and wants to take advantage of the immense popularity of Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller and, for many comrades, the sooner the better. With each passing day, Jamaicans are quickly appreciating that the recently-elected Prime Minister is not the change that Jamaica needs as she is definitely an integral part of the old, tired, visionless, PNP party that has misgoverned Jamaica for nearly 17 years.
Over the next two to three months, the likelihood is that the election fever will be everywhere. What new and different will the JLP do this time to ensure electoral victory, which has escaped the party for the previous five occasions? For a start, the JLP must find the ways and means to counter the propaganda warfare of the PNP.
WINNING WITH GIMMICKS
I strongly believe that with the assistance of the media, churches, and many civil organisations, the PNP has successfully won the air and media battle at election time. In the 2002 General Elections, the JLP had the best manifesto ever created to make Jamaica an attractive and better place to live, but it never got, or took, the opportunity to explain it to the Jamaica people. The PNP with its attractive election gimmicks such as 'Don't stop the progress' overwhelmed the JLP public relations machinery.
In truth, the JLP has never been good at winning general elections. Somehow, it seems to depend on the PNP to lose them, which is an extremely poor strategy and which the JLP cannot afford to depend on this time. The JLP must go out on the ground, in every corner of Jamaica, to take its message that Jamaica deserves better, and explain to every man and woman how it can deliver a brighter future and a better quality of life. After 17 years, the PNP will have great difficulty explaining why Jamaica is in such a mess - but it is certainly up to the task and will blame everybody and everything else for the predicament that Jamaica finds itself. When things go well, the PNP takes credit. But, when things fall apart, it accepts no responsibility; it is always somebody else's fault.
When one reflects on the tremendous election strategies of the PNP, it is easily discerned how the party will sacrifice everything, including the national interest, to remain in power. In 1976, the PNP called a state of emergency, which damaged Jamaica's image everywhere, primarily to secure an electoral advantage by locking up key JLP candidates and election workers. For the general elections of 1993, 1997 and 2002, it depended on the security forces to carry out inexplicable raids and unleash state terrorism on the people of Western Kingston. For those who do not remember what took place in Tivoli Gardens months before the elections were called, they should go back to The Gleaner archives to refresh their memories.
'RUN WID IT'
Yet, the most effective election strategy of the PNP is to allow the economy to 'run wid it', as it was most notably explained by the Minister of Finance, Dr. Omar Davies. When one examines the inflow of money into the economy whenever an election is around the corner, it is quite clear that the present government will sacrifice the well-being of the economy to ensure election victory, as it did in previous elections.
The effect of allowing money supply to go astray is to give a temporary feel good factor, which has to be corrected immediately after the elections. Jamaica has suffered enormously from this election strategy. It caused the financial collapse in the mid-nineties and forced the 14 billion and 9 billion dollars tax packages of 2003 and 2005, which were part and parcel of Dr. Davies' correction for the election spending of 2002.
With elections around the corner, it is time for the pundits to examine objectively some of the strategies used by the parties over the decades. At the same time, carefully anticipate what election strategies will be used by both parties this time, as they both seek victory at the polls.
Delroy Chuck is an attorney-at-law and Member of Parliament. He can be contacted by email at delchuck@hotmail.com.
