THE ruling People’s National Party (PNP) is being punished by the electorate for its handling of various crises and scandals, and its declining support can be traced directly to voter dissatisfaction, according to political commentator Shallman Scott.

Scott, commenting on the findings published by the Sunday Observer, which shows the ruling party five percentage points ahead of the Opposition Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) – but only 1.7 points ahead when the margin of error is factored in – said there was also dissatisfaction on the part of the electorate because perceived benefits from Simpson Miller’s stewardship had not materialised.

“There is dissatisfaction with the way that the scandals and crises have been handled. Many feel they have not been handled with the efficiency and dispatch that is required [and] the electors therefore reacted by moving their support,” Scott said.

In addition, Scott said the public and contentious industrial relations climate had also contributed to the party’s declining voter support. He cited the negotiations between the police, nurses and teachers, saying the protracted disputes over wages had not helped the party or the government’s position.

“There are those who believed that with the prime minister’s stated love and preference for the poor, much would have started to flow in their direction. They have not seen much of that. They have seen well-intentioned posturing taking place, but nothing tangible has come their way so far,” Scott remarked.

Meanwhile, Scott noted that the JLP had gained from its exposure of various scandals, but said the party had also lost support despite increased activism in the last 10 months.

However, PNP General Secretary Colin Campbell said the uncommitted, and not the JLP, has been the biggest beneficiary of the PNP’s declining support.

“The polls show that the PNP’s declining support has gone to the uncommitted, and this is not surprising because this tends to be the reaction in an off-election period,” Campbell said yesterday.

Added Campbell: “The JLP also lost five per cent of its support. But the gap between the lead is only narrower because more PNP support has gone to the uncommitted. But you must remember that the country has been hearing the JLP’s message, even though the polls were conducted before they went on the road. But we have not gone on the road yet and our message is also not out there,” he added.

Dr John Rapley, senior lecturer in the Department of Government at the University of the West Indies (UWI) Mona, while agreeing that uncommitted support had risen, pointed out that the JLP had tapped into that base. However, he too sees no reason for panic within the ruling party.

“I don’t think there is reason to panic. I think there is reason to grow anxious [on the part of the PNP]. Their electoral strategy is becoming more and more to depend on one person, and that’s usually a rather unnerving prospect. it is much easier to organise a campaign against one individual than against a party. So the JLP’s advertising campaign would be to focus their resources on exposing Portia as a weak or indecisive leader,” he said.

He believes a general election campaign will come down to the issue of party leaders, and expects the JLP to go after Simpson Miller’s perceived flaws.

“The way for them to win is to focus all their attention on trying to expose her as a weak leader. I think the invitation to a debate is one axis on which they are doing that, and I think that Bruce Golding feels confident that if he could debate her head-to-head, he would be able to beat her. If she refuses the invitation, he can then sort of harry her on the campaign trail with the fact that she is afraid to stand up to him,” Rapley said.

He said that although it was good that the JLP wanted to secure some of the uncommitted votes, the same polls say that people still favoured Simpson Miller over Golding as leader.

“What this poll suggests is that if the PNP ran a campaign that emphasises her leadership, in other words, she is the campaign not the party, they still are in a relatively comfortable position,” he said.

The polls also show that support for the PNP had declined by 12.3 per cent in the 10-month period since November 2005 when the PNP had 42.4 per cent to the JLP’s 30.8 per cent

Meanwhile, Brasco Lee, a former minister of government in the 1980s Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) government yesterday argued that ‘mistrust’ for the JLP was reflected in the latest Stone Polls, which he described as ‘unbelievable’.

Lee, who is now campaign manager to Donnette Brown Reid, the PNP representative for South Trelawny, said in the run-up to the last three general elections, the JLP was ahead in the polls but the PNP won the elections.

“After 17 years. the PNP are five points ahead of the JLP; this is unbelievable at this stage. I predicted that this would have been the situation. I not only predicted this, but I told it to Bruce Golding.”

Lee was speaking at the PNP Region One meeting at the Brown’s Town Community College in St Ann yesterday.