Burke

Long-standing member of the People's National Party (PNP) Paul Burke has retired from active politics.

Burke, a PNP organiser and former chairman of the parties Region Three, advised party leaders of his decision yesterday in a strong-eight page letter that was distributed during a meeting of the PNP's National Executive Council (NEC).

Burke said he was disgusted by the current leadership race, which he described as a contest "centred on personal and leadership ambitions" and said he would not be participating in either of the two campaigns.

"I am prepared to support the party regardless of who wins the contest," he said in the letter. "However, I do not know whether I will be prepared to continue as a member of this party in the face of the continued threat to democracy in our party," the letter continued.

Burke, who was an active member of the Team Portia campaign in the last presidential race in 2006, said the current leadership challenge was distracting the PNP from advancing the fundamental work of the party's Political Edu-cation Commission and Structures Review Committee - two outfits in which he has been playing an influential role.

"I believe if we had advanced the work in both these areas and had not been diverted by the internal presidential elections, it would be a different People's National Party today. I believe we would not have much of the problems we have today," he said.

Big money

According to Burke, the party's internal democratic system has been corrupted by the introduction of "big money on a wholesale level to directly influence and buy delegates," in the mid-1990s.

"Cabinet ministers and the party leadership must have known what was happening, who was respon-sible and the implications. We did nothing," he declared. "Although some of us spoke in the executive committee at the time, we kept silent as a party because we feared the negative publicity and backlash," Burke added.

In a story carried on A3 of yesterday’s Gleaner, titled ‘Paul Burke retires from active politics’, it should have been stated that Burke was retiring from active field politics. Burke remains a member of the People’s National Party in which he is chairman of the Structural Review Committee and chairman of the Political Education Commission.