MONTEGO BAY, St James – Dr Karl Bylthe was expected to be named in the Cabinet of the new prime minister, Portia Simpson Miller, and so yesterday he could not hide his disappointment when he was not invited to join the ‘new-look’ team.

“I am haunted by a ghost from my past, but what is devastating is that I know not its origin, therefore, I am unable to confront it,” Blythe said in a statement, released shortly after Simpson Miller 14-member Cabinet was sworn in at King’s House by Governor General Kenneth Hall.

“As one who has a deep abiding faith in God, I can say with very clear conscience that I know of absolutely nothing that would make me an unfit person to be appointed to anyone’s Cabinet,” said Blythe, the Central Westmoreland member of parliament and one of the four contenders in the recently-concluded presidential election of his ruling People’s National Party (PNP).

Blythe, a vice-president of the PNP, suggested, however, that he might have been sidelined because of the Operations Pride scandal under his watch as minister of housing.

He resigned from the Cabinet in April 2002, six months before the general election, after the government-commissioned Erwin Angus probe of the operations of the National Housing Development Corporation (NHDC) pointed to ministerial interference, cronyism and poor management in Operation Pride, the government’s shelter programme.

However, an examination of the Erwin Angus report, conducted by Ambassador Dr Kenneth Rattray, accused the Angus team of failing to carry out a rigorous and in-depth examination of the facts before arriving at its conclusions and cleared Blythe of any wrongdoing.

On the eve of elections to choose his successor as president of the ruling People’s National Party (PNP), former prime minister P J Patterson defended Dr Karl Blythe’s stewardship of the controversial Operation Pride programme that had resulted in Blythe’s departure from the Cabinet just under four years ago.

In the meantime, Blythe has indicated that he would announce plans for his political future after “counsel with my Heavenly Father, after which I shall consult with my constituents, the party workers in Central Westmoreland, my family and close friends”.