Delroy Chuck

The Prime Minister, the Most Honourable Portia Simpson Miller, after almost a year in office, does not seem to believe she is the head of Her Majesty's government; at least, she doesn't act and speak that way. She is forever reminding everyone that she is Prime Minister and, on the political platform, she behaves and speaks as if she is campaigning to become Prime Minister. Surely, Jamaicans expect their heads of Government to act stately and be prime ministerial.

On television last Friday night, TVJ showed a clip of the PM arriving in Oracabessa by helicopter and later addressing a party political meeting. Significantly, she flew in by helicopter because if she used the 'rocky roads in Oracabessa' : see Tyrone's Watch, p. A4, Tuesday's Gleaner, 27th February, she would get whiplash and, possibly, her spanking Volvo motorcar would suffer serious damage.

How many heard her last Friday, shouting and condemning the Leader of the Opposition for saying something that he clearly never said. When I heard the PM allege mistakenly that the Leader of the Opposition wanted Cricket World Cup (CWC) to flop, I wondered who had lost their brain. No decent, well-thinking Jamaican could yearn for CWC to fail and definitely no one in the JLP has expressed that hope. Yes, we have discussed and questioned whether we are properly prepared and the enormous expenditure to expand Sabina Park and to build a new stadium, especially in circumstances where our indebtedness is choking and denying every other area of national life. The PM owes the Leader of the Opposition an apology.

Unclear facts

Who is the Prime Minister fooling when shenow argues that the $635 million dollars clean-up and beautification programme so proudly and pompously announced at her party's annual conference was not meant for CWC or that it would not have commenced in weeks, months or even a year's time? Is this money meant for another announcement in her next Budget speech? And, why should we believe her or any of her new announcements when, to date, she has failed to find the $635 million? Where did the PM get her facts or what was she thinking when she made this announcement, which was, actually, the only significant highlight in her speech. Just like the Trafigura money, the media must demand of the PM where is the money, otherwise her credibility is at stake. In truth, it is time we celebrate and highlight achievements instead of announcements.

Then, in what appears on public television to be a tracing and verbal slugging affair, the PM chastised the Leader of the Opposition for preaching doom and gloom. It seems any criticism or identification of problems is doom and gloom. When leaders close their eyes and minds to the challenges, chaos and carnage around them and, simply, paint misleading pictures of a country on the right track, it becomes clear that they cannot distinguish illusion from reality and facts from fiction.

As far as this government is concerned, we must ignore and forget the problems of mounting debt, bad roads, dilapidated government buildings, daily carnage from crime and violence, and all the ills that make living in Jamaica so frustrating and unnecessarily horrendous, and only think and speak positively. It can't work. The right solutions can only be found if we make the right diagnoses. When a government does not understand the problems of the country, or even think the country has problems, it will not find solutions.

Thus, when the PM and her government want only credit and praise and carefully sidestep criticism and blame, we know they are not capable or interested in solving the many problems and challenges bedevilling our country. Intruth, our PM needs help. For the short time she remains as Prime Minister, her office needs to advise and manage her and to steer her on a prime ministerial path, lest the office be brought into disrepute.