With last Tuesday's defeat of the Barbados Labour Party (BLP) administration, it is increasingly looking as if the victory scored by the People's National Movement in Trinidad and Tobago to retain power at the recent November 5 poll may be an aberration in a perceived political wind of change sweeping away governments within the Caribbean Community.

Rickey Singh

In this column last Sunday, I had raised the question whether Barbados' January 15 general election would result in a fourth change of government among independent Caricom member countries within a 13-month period that started with the defeat of the second-term St Lucia Labour Party administration.

Well, the change did occur, ending with a vengeance the three-term administration of former Prime Minister Owen Arthur who was seeking an unprecedented fourth term.

In a stunning reversal of political fortunes, the BLP suffered a painful defeat by David Thompson's Democratic Labour Party (DLP) which was given a strong 20-10 mandate to govern the country for the next five years. Thompson will be announcing his first cabinet tomorrow (Monday) to coincide with the birth anniversary of the DLP's founder and National Hero Errol Walton Barrow.

If the victory of the opposition Virgin Islands Party at last August 20 general election in the British Virgin Islands is added to the change last Tuesday in Barbados, it would mean that there have been five changes in government at six national elections within 13 months in Caricom of which the BVI is an associated state.

Democratic Labour Party (DLP) leader David Thompson celebrating his election victory at DLP headquarters with his wife Mara last Tuesday night. (Photo: The Nation Newspaper)

The other changes took place in The Bahamas and Jamaica.
Do not expect either the government of Prime Minister Said Musa in Belize nor that of Prime Minister Keith Mitchell in Grenada to agree, but indications point to likely changes in government at coming elections in both these Caricom member countries.

BELIZE: Earlier this month, Prime Minister Musa announced fresh general elections for next month, February 7. In 2003, Musa's incumbent People's United Party (PUP) won a second term with a very convincing 22-7 parliamentary majority.

Now its challenger for power, Dean Barrow's United Democratic Party (UDP) thinks the conditions exist for it to be swept into power by a perceived changed mood of the electorate. With the addition of two new constituencies, the battle by Musa's PUP and Barrow's UDP will be for a 31-member elected parliament.

GRENADA: In Grenada, where Prime Minister Mitchell has been facing increasing demands from the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) of Tillman Thomas to call fresh elections, constitutionally due in November this year, an announcement of such a development could well come when the governing New National Party (NNP) holds its annual convention that's scheduled for January 27.

Crucial difference


A crucial difference between Musa's quest for a third-term government and that of Mitchell's bid for a fourth consecutive term is that the former had secured his March 2003 electoral victory not just with a landslide 22-seat majority, but 53 per cent of the valid popular votes.

In contrast, the latter had survived defeat by a one-seat margin (8 to 7) and with less than 50 per cent of the votes cast (48 per cent NNP to the NDC's 45.06 per cent) for the 15-member House of Representatives.

That one-seat majority came from Carriacou by a mere six votes. It was unsuccessfully challenged and Mitchell's NNP has been engaged since in strenuous political manoeuvres to maintain power amid natural and man-made disasters.

Not unexpectedly, Prime Minister Mitchell was quick to declare, following the defeat of Arthur's government in Barbados, that he did not recognise the changing administrations as any political wind of change blowing across Caricom.

We have 16 days from today to find out what the case will be in Belize on February 7, and then to find out later when Grenada's 2008 general elections will take place.

The Barbados scenario

In relation to what took place last Tuesday in Barbados, if I may borrow a line with adaptation from President Bill Clinton, it was "the mood for change, stupid". Not the 'economy'; not 'leadership', as touted by the incumbent BLP that resulted in the dramatic change in the Barbadian political landscape.

The trouncing of Arthur's incumbent BLP by a united and reinvigorated DLP with a 20-10 parliamentary victory, underscored how very badly the 'Bees' read the political temperature and for which he has paid a very heavy price, though by no means disgraced.

To bring into a 2008 general election campaign the advertising blitz and US presidential-style politicking with a leadership theme that had served it well for both a second and third term in its bid to create history with a fourth consecutive victory, was to demonstrate a surprising disconnect by the BLP's strategists with an electorate that has a history of mixing loving embraces with hostile rejections.

Ten years after he had led this country into political independence, Errol Walton Barrow, 'Father of the Nation', was to suffer the pain of such a rejection back in September 1976 when he was confident that his outstanding leadership stature and the prevailing social and economic stability would propel him to an unprecedented fourth term victory.

Some 32 years later, the only other Barbadian politician who, like Barrow, had the honour of heading three consecutive governments, Owen Seymour Arthur, undoubtedly one of the best Prime Ministers and leaders of Caricom, was to repeat that error of judgement, although priding himself as a good political student of "Barrowism".

That error by him and his campaign strategists holds a significant explanation why last Tuesday's election has left Arthur, Barbados' fifth prime minister, mulling his future out of power, and David Thompson as the country's sixth Prime Minister, currently shaping his first cabinet.

For all the political gimmickry, the lavish expenditures on a sustained and saturated media blitz, by both the Dems and Bees, as well as the indecencies associated with "money politics" for votes in various constituencies, it was the intoxicating "time for change" mood that, in the final analysis, triumphed over the incumbent's twin focus during a very intense two-week campaign - "leadership that matters" and "economic performance" record.
Back in 1976, when Barrow had failed to achieve a fourth-term victory, the DLP was reduced to seven seats in a then 24-member House of Assembly--a painful reversal from its 18-6 victory against the BLP at the previous 1971 election.
Now, in 2008 the BLP, which had secured a massive 23-7 majority at the 2003 elections, has been despatched by the electorate with 10 seats and with nine cabinet ministers among the 20 defeated candidates.

Owen Arthur was philosophical in his acceptance of defeat, praising the democratic process that remains such a sturdy feature of governance in this Eastern Caribbean state; and noting that "in the 69 years of our party, we have gone this way before..."

The cycle of electoral victories and defeats in Barbados seems to suggest that today's parties should be more mindful of the nature of the beast that is the Barbadian electorate with a renowned capacity to love, for as long as 10 or even 15 years, only to later resort, if so disturbed, with a vengeful rejection with transparency.

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