Dear Editor,

I refer to the article in the Sunday Observer of November 25 highlighting the prime minister’s address to the National Executive Council. I found the contents of her address very disappointing.

The prime minister squandered a golden opportunity to engage the members in meaningful discussion regarding the many problems facing the country.

Instead, Mrs Simpson Miller lambasted Opposition Leader Andrew Holness for publicly stating that his party is in campaign mode. Unlike other times when campaigning took different forms “like surrogates on talk shows”, certain organisations would use their clout to influence the electorate and some media houses made their political leaning obvious. These are all legitimate methods of campagning. There are other universal means of campaigning that are used in politics early, creating a database with all relevant information of voters, including birthdays.

Regular contacts with the electorate via meetings, print media television, e-mail, texting and Facebook contacts are effective ways of campagning. These are modern campaign methods and are most effective. Obama’s campaign machinery has taught the world what campaigning is all about – they had data that identified every single voter, even the type of shows they watched.

The prime minister is an astute politician and one of the best campaigners this country has, but she has to move with the times. Making a statement that early campaigning will affect our relationship with our international partners, deter business investors and affect IMF negotiations is utter rubbish. What affects all this is bad governance, of which this country has been guilty for the last 45 years. It is time for the country to demand good governance from its politicians.

Tony Miles

tonymiles1940@gmail.com