CONFIRMATION has come that another Jamaican sports personality of merit will seek the approval of the electorate to realise a dream of entering the House of Representatives.

We speak of Olympian Ms Juliet Cuthbert, who has not only sought and obtained membership in the Opposition Jamaica Labour Party (JLP), but from all accounts will contest a St Catherine constituency at the next general elections.

Ms Cuthbert made Jamaica proud when she notched two silver medals at the 1992 Olympic Games in Barcelona, Spain.

She finished second to American Gail Devers in the 100 metres, and was runner-up also to another United States sprinter, Gwen Torrence, in the 200 metres performances that we feel were stout-hearted and admirable in an era when drug use was rampant among US and European athletes in particular.

The St Thomas native and proud Morant Bay High School graduate later added other achievements, including a bronze in the 4×100 metres at the 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games, which could easily have been a gold had sprinter Nikole Mitchell not run a poor third leg; a World Championship sprint relay gold in Toyko, Japan, in 1999; a sprint relay bronze, and a second-place finish in the 200 metres at the 1997 World Championship. We admire Ms Cuthbert’s courage for wanting to enter a field that so many Jamaicans have scorned, because of the stigma of corruption that has often characterised it.

We caution her, however, to warm up properly before she faces the starter, as the kind of politics being practised in this country is not something that is easy to adapt to.

Ms Cuthbert may well have good intentions to represent her people in the most professional manner and we believe that, if she is successful, she will make a good member of parliament.

She must, however, consider also the demands that MPs face daily from constituents: handouts to buy food, bury their dead, pay medical bills, drink a liquor, and every other kind of patronage thinkable.

Maybe she will be the one to spearhead the mission that will result in long-awaited changes to the political system.

However she should be warned that former sports personalities have not been so successful in previous general elections; maybe out of fear by those casting ballots that they would rather see their heroes and heroines not dilute their achievements by entering a notso- gracious field.

We can remember the Hon Herb McKenley, that wonderful athlete who ran on a Jamaica Labour Party ticket in the 1972 general election and who was humiliated by eventual Cabinet minister Allan Isaacs in the then St Andrew North constituency.

On the eve of the election, Mr Isaacs declared on a People’s National Party platform how he admired Mr McKenley, but emphasised that, should a majority of voters elect the great athlete, all he would do is run away from them and neglect his responsibilities.

Mr Isaacs polled 10,610 votes to Mr McKenley’s 2,822. Notwithstanding that, we hope that Ms Cuthbert will still consider running her race.