We now understand why Prime Minister Andrew Holness gave that lengthy speech after being sworn in as prime minister at King’s House. It is excellent politics to use excerpts of the speech in political advertisements.

But regarding the clip about ending garrison politics, how many times in the past have there been walks by leaders of opposing parties into areas of political turmoil? One day someone will write a history of the peace initiatives that go back to Central Kingston which were organised by Roman Catholic nun, Sister Benedict Chung, in 1973.

If peace marches were enough to end political garrisons, they would have ended in 1973. I suggested four things that need to be done (including proportional representation) in my Observer column, “Remedy for political garrisons”, November 3.

The People’s National Party complained that if a general election were to be held before November 30 this year, then 42,000 people would be left off the voters’ list. Last week Prime Minister Holness said that the election would include the new voters, as it would be held sometime after November 30.

Previously, an integral part of the JLP’s election strategy was to make sure that the voters’ list was inadequate for the PNP as happened in 1967, 1972 and 1983. When the PNP lost in 1967 Norman Manley said it was hard to accept the election results because tens of thousands of Jamaican adults did not have the right to vote.

The voters’ list in 1972 was three years old – it was taken up in 1969. This meant that since the age of voting then was the minimum of 21 years, one had to be 24 to vote in 1972. In that year, the Hugh Shearer-led JLP government repeated the trick used in 1967 but it did not work.

So heavy was the swing to the PNP in 1972 that of the 53 available seats then, the PNP took 37, but lost one by legal action in 1974. Likewise, in 1983 when the Jamaica Labour Party’s Edward Seaga called the election, the voters’ list was three years old.

In this regard, is Prime Minister Andrew Holness really different from his predecessors? Or would he have announced the election date already, were it not for an internal JLP need to reassess at least four of their candidates?

JLP’s youth arm G2K sent around e-mails taunting the PNP to boycott the elections as they did in 1983, as if they would rejoice if the PNP were to do that. Did someone educate G2K that election boycotts appear to international lending agencies as a suspension of democracy?

Those international lending agencies then worry about how they will be repaid. Edward Seaga learnt that the hard way in 1983. This is why he ensured that the 1989 general election called in the three-month grace period after the five-year term limit because of Hurricane Gilbert was free and fair.

Prime Minister Andrew Holness is also the minister of education. Concerns were raised because both are full-time jobs. When journalists questioned Information Minister Arthur Williams about it, he shrugged it off by recalling that Edward Seaga was both prime minister and minister of finance in the 1980s.

Throughout the 1980s there were complaints about bottlenecks all the time, and that everything had to await one individual to deal with important things (namely then prime minister Edward Seaga). Even JLP ministers of government complained privately about it. Indeed, when the change of government came in 1989, some rejoiced that there would no longer be any bottlenecks.

Finance Minister Audley Shaw has accused the Opposition of irresponsibility and trying to destabilise the Jamaican economy. He said he was appealing to the parliamentary ombudsman to rein in Opposition Leader Portia Simpson Miller. She said that those who seek to buy up properties for sale by the Urban Development Corporation should be mindful that there might be a change of government.

In the 1980s, Seymour Mullings as Opposition spokesman on finance in the 1980s stated that the sale of National Commercial Bank would only be temporary because a new PNP government would once again nationalise the bank. There was a hue and cry about the statement. However, NCB was not re-nationalised.

But the first time I ever heard the word “destabilisation” was in the 1970s and it was members of the then JLP Opposition who were being accused of doing that to the then PNP government led by Michael Manley.

When the PNP was in power from 1972 to 1980, a senior cabinet minister spoke in Parliament one year of going abroad to seek loans for Jamaica only to hear that a certain high-level Opposition politician went to the international lending agencies before him and told the banks not to lend Jamaica anything. The accusation was never denied.

Condolences to the families of two Jamaica College Old Boys who have died – former JC head boy, David Coore, and journalist Tino Geddes.

ekrubm765@yahoo.com