Livingstone Thompson, Guest Columnist

The recent swearing-in of the Electoral Commission represents, some have said, a significant forward movement in the structural development of the system of governance in our country.

This development has been in the womb of the political system since the 1978 Representation of the People Interim Reform Act. A commission free from political interference was seen as a necessary safeguard for the credibility of the electoral process.

With this development, the independence of electoral oversight, which evidently was in question, is now protected by the constitution. Given the outgoing EAC chairman's recent sense of disgust with the delay in bringing about this action, he should be very pleased with the development.

I suppose I should be 'oohing' and 'aahing' about the change but I find that I am not as excited as I suppose I should be and can't seem to put my finger on why this is so. It may be that I am simply unschooled in the finer art of electoral management.

This is true, at least to some extent because I did not even see when a copy of the EAC recommendations and the relevant bill were made public. It could also be that my lukewarm response may be related to the fact that although the commission has a different status from the EAC and will report differently, there is not expected to be any difference in operations or deliveries arising from this change.

Like predecessor

When the Parliament approved the recommendations of the EAC and cleared the way for the change, the high-quality performance of the EAC was highlighted.

Speaking in mid-2005, Dr Peter Phillips said that the work of the EAC is "one of the success stories of the country." If this were true, we might be guilty of having fixed something that was not broken.

There are a number of reasons why the present Electoral Commission is not expected to outperform its predecessor in either the short or medium run.

First, the internal structure of the commission will be more or less the same as what operated under the EAC. The EAC had members who were there to represent the interests of their party, and there were other members, who were not expected to represent any party interest. As I understand it, the present commission has four nominated members, two each from the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition.

Additionally, there are four members who, though having a somewhat hazy nominations process, are appointed by the GG after consultation with the (same!) Prime Minister and Leader of the Opposition. Some clarity about who might put forward the names of these other four members would be helpful.

The ninth member of the commission will be the director of elections, who would have been recom-mended by the eight members already appointed.

This manner of deciding on the director of elections is probably the only real difference in the internal structure. Even so, it is not expected to result in any real difference, as I imagine that the recommendation will likewise result from a transparent, interview process in which the best applicant for the position is chosen.

The second reason why we should not expect any immediate, improved performance from the commission is that there is as yet no change in the personalities for selected membership. Barring any radically new matter of ethics or morality, they are, therefore, expected to decide along the lines they have been deciding.

Furthermore, with the former chairman of the now dissolved EAC selected to the commission, it is unlikely that the members are going to elect a different person as chairman of the commission.

Finally, the director of elections under the EAC, Danville Walker, who has been doing a fine job, is continuing as director under the commission. So, considering the internal structure and the personalities, we should really see the commission as the same EAC in new clothes.

Opportunity missed

Finding persons with unquestioned credibility and who enjoy the confidence of the political parties takes care and thought. Happily, throughout the life of the EAC, the selectors have made good judgements about both members and directors of election. The difficulty the selectors must have faced with the naming of this commission, then, must have been how to exclude a person whose performance has been of a high quality.

In fact, my fear is that with the same personalities and the same structures, the commission will carry forward the same thinking, the same fears, the same inertia and the same caution, which to my mind were the real humbugs they had operating as the EAC.

It would be unrealistic, then, to think that the priorities of the same personalities, under the same chairman, with the same director of elections, will change simply with the change of status. I do not, therefore, think that we are any closer now to deciding on the issues relating to campaign financing - despite protests I hear to the contrary.

No visible difference

I am not privy to the argument that demonstrates what will be accomplished now under the commission that could not have been accomplished before under the EAC.

So, I have concluded that the status of the EAC was more an issue for its members than for the rest of us, who are more concerned with deliveries. I suppose that in time, the real and visible difference of having a commission instead of a committee, apart from the question of status, will become clear.

Otherwise, a change, without corresponding improvement in the quality of the deliveries, would have to be called cosmetic.

Dr. Livingstone Thompson is a Jamaican theologian working in Ireland. He may be contacted at livingstone.thompson@oceanfree.net.