HOPEWELL, Hanover — Veteran politician Dr DK Duncan is yet to make public whether or not he will be contesting the Hanover Eastern constituency in the upcoming general election.

It is a seat the experienced Duncan has held for the party since 2007 when he defeated the then incumbent Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) Member of Parliament Barrington Gray by 10 votes following a magisterial recount.

But while Duncan, often described as a master political strategist, is yet to make his intentions known to his constituents, Montego Bay businessman and Hanover native Dave ‘Spoon’ Brown has been working assiduously over the past few months to ensure that the seat returns to the Opposition JLP, whenever the next general election is held.

“Since June 26 I have been putting in the work. I have been doing canvassing, meeting the residents, undertaking community projects……. it’s very challenging, but the needs of the people are great,” said Brown, who was asked to apply for being caretaker of the constituency following the sudden resignation of the JLP’s Paula Kerr-Jarrett in January 2014.

The charismatic attorney and philanthropist, daughter of prominent JLP figure Christopher Bovell, who was defeated by Duncan in the 2011 General Election by a margin of 264 votes, cited in her resignation letter the need to spend more time in her family business as her reasons for leaving representational politics.

But key JLP functionaries in the constituency were not convinced.

Many believed that Kerr-Jarrett was a casualty of the fractious 2013 leadership race between JLP Leader Andrew Holness and veteran politician Audley Shaw.

It was no secret that Kerr-Jarrett was a key supporter in Shaw’s campaign to replace Holness as leader of the party.

Brown, a Cornwall College Old Boy who served the Jamaica Constabulary Force for almost a decade, told the Jamaica Observer that the first few weeks of working in the constituency was very difficult due to Kerr-Jarrett’s resignation.

“It was very difficult because a lot of the party workers and supporters believed that she (Kerr-Jarrett) was forced out. They figured that it had something to with the leadership race, so they refused to cooperate,” said the motor vehicle parts dealer.

“It reached a stage where I had to get the leader (Holness) to come down and talk to them,” said the 49-year-old Brown, who unsuccessfully contested the Montego Bay North East Division of the St James Parish Council in the local government election of 2012.

But the situation, he says, is now much different.

“Everybody is now on board. We are working as a team now with one goal in mind, and that is to win the seat for the JLP,” noted the soft-spoken Brown.

There are three parish council divisions in the constituency. Two — Sandy Bay and Chester Castle — represented by former Lucea Mayor Lloyd Hill and sitting Mayor Wynter McIntosh are controlled by the ruling People’s National Party, while the Opposition party’s Devon Brown, a cousin of the JLP standard bearer in the constituency, represents the Hopewell Division.

According to the JLP Hanover Eastern candidate, the constituency is characterised by poor road conditions, lack of potable water, and high levels of unemployment.

“It is really a picture of neglect. In fact, it’s neglect of the highest order,” Brown said of the constituency, where subsistence farming is the mainstay of the local economy.

He cites communities such as Friendship, New Milns, Copse, Lethe, Cascade, Pondside, Jericho, and Claremount as areas where the wanton neglect is glaring.

Stressing that the neglect has resulted in a brain drain, Brown told the Sunday Observer, that over the past few months he has been working hard to instill hope in the constituents as he tries to make a meaningful contribution to their lives.

He said that over the last few weeks he has expended more than $400,000 to provide back-to-school supplies for scores of needy students in the constituency.

“Additionally, several football competitions have been launched across the communities, a number of community-oriented projects have been undertaken, and so the people are beginning to feel hopeful about the future,” Brown explained.

But still, there is much more work to be done, he said.

Expressing confidence that he will bring home the seat for the JLP in the upcoming polls, Brown said that he has already identified several projects that will be beneficial to the constituents.