Dear Editor,

I notice that the leader of the Opposition and Jamaica Labour Party (JLP), Andrew Holness, is trying very hard to convince us uncommitted voters to come off the fence and vote for his party. I can tell Holness that his actions and chattering haven’t really done much to convince us to vote for his party.

Take his recently announced plan to remove school fees, for instance. Holness is promising that if his JLP should be elected to office, school fees will be a thing of the past. Now, as a guardian who has to find school fees every year to pay, one would expect that I would be happy. Indeed, I would be very happy if I didn’t have to pay any fee. However, I am concerned.

Seeing that the education system is already starved for funds, where does Holness and the JLP plan to get the money to make up for what will be a significant shortfall, should they do away with those fees?

According to Holness, he would prioritise the State’s finances by reducing the travelling and phone calls that officials will make. Of course, we all know that those will not even make a dent for the shortfall. So I really don’t know why Holness is taking us uncommitted voters for fools.

Then he told us that he and his JLP can be trusted, and that he would make the better leader by guarding against the “creeping dictatorship”. I wonder if Holness is aware of the reason we uncommitted voters are uncommitted voters: We don’t have short memories.

Interestingly, Holness seems to have forgotten that he demonstrated to us, not so long ago, that even he doesn’t trust his own party officials. No other way could make this any clearer than his attempt to control his senators with those pre-signed and undated letters. If he cannot trust his own subordinates, why should we, the uncommitted, trust them, or him?

Talking about that, the court ruled that his action over that same pre-signed and undated letters was unconstitutional. How can he be warning us about the “creeping dictatorship” when he himself was acting like one?

Now, we have Holness painting a picture of doom as far as the fight for crime is concerned. He tried to give us the impression that this Government is destroying the police, as 800 members quit. As it turned out, that 800 included officers who had applied for leave. Holness must have realised that any uncommitted voter could have simply checked the police for the true figures, so why is he trying to mislead us?

You know, a lot of us uncommitted voters, including me, were very hopeful when Holness took over the leadership of the JLP. We finally thought that, through him, we would finally see the change in our politics that we so desperately need. He has, however, proven to be a very big let-down. There is no way that uncommitted voters like me can vote for him! What hopelessness!

Michael A Dingwall

michael_a_dingwall@hotmail.com