SO the general election will not be held this year. However, it is a pity that in Jamaica politics is really a game. The two major political parties pack the voters’ lists with their own supporters in an exercise that is referred to as canvassing. The party workers then get those ‘canvassed’ to vote on election day, along party lines, instead of making up their own minds independently on the issues.

Because of this, politicians need not be logical and consistent in their campaigning. And, because many Jamaicans are inconsistent and illogical in their arguments — thanks to our education system that does not teach students to think logically — the politicians get away with it.

The statement by Dr Fenton Ferguson that the prematurely born “are not babies in the real sense” is, in my opinion, a consequence of the abortion culture that erroneously states that a foetus is not a living being. By extension, then, premature babies are not really seen as “babies in the real sense”. I have been asking why there are so many premature babies being born in Jamaica. Some say that it is due to carelessness on the parts of the mothers. The abortion culture feeds the care-free sex culture that dulls the sense of responsibility to the life being carried in the womb. How many women in Jamaica “dash weh” their babies? And yet we holler and bawl when a statement like the one Ferguson made is uttered. How inconsistent and illogical can we get?

We complain about the so-called gift of the prison from the British Government and opine that Britain should keep all prisoners who committed their crimes on British soil. Yet we fail to understand, even in light of the prison gift, that England does not really want to have much to do with us anymore, and illogically believe that Britain still welcomes appeals from Jamaica to the British Privy Council.

Senator Marlene Malahoo Forte speaks about having a letter from members of the British Privy Council who would be willing to continue hearing appeals from Jamaica. Does the senator also have a letter from British citizens begging us most earnestly to please continue using their Privy Council because they love to spend their taxes on Jamaican court matters?

Are we prepared to wait for Great Britain to kick us out of their Privy Council? Or are we waiting for Britain to say that continued use of their Privy Council cancels their reparation debt? I suspect that the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) does not care as long as they succeed in pressuring the Government into calling a referendum on the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) because the first and last referendum on September 19, 1961 benefited them.

The issue was whether Jamaica should remain a part of the West Indies Federation. The JLP did not really address the issue of federation in their referendum campaign. They spoke to other issues like the stadium, the five-storey ministry of education (later extended to the other building on the same compound) and the dumping up of Negril for tourist hotels as being a colossal waste of money.

Perhaps the plan, this time around, if the Opposition succeeds in getting the Government into a referendum on the CCJ, would be to fill Jamaica with talk irrelevant to the CCJ, such as health care and crime. We might also hear that the cost of living was much less yesterday than it is today (politicians of all sides all over the democratic world traditionally use this tactic); but never that the standard of living has improved.

There was partial free education from 1957 and in 1973; Michael Manley introduced free education. In later years, no doubt due to stipulations of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), cost-sharing was introduced. But every year, in September, the Ministry of Education states that no child can be refused if they have not paid the fees. So, in effect, education is free. How then is the JLP promising something that is already in place? This is totally illogical.

Also, in 1973, the hospital fees were abolished but were re-introduced many later years, no doubt due to the stipulations of the IMF. When the hospital fees were abolished in 1972, Edward Seaga, as Opposition spokesman on finance, made a comment during his budget speech in Parliament that it was hard to collect the fees anyway. But if would-be patients are not turned away if they do not pay fees, isn’t health care free? Again the JLP is being illogical.

Politicians will always be politicians. The very political party that harshly criticised free education in the past pushes it now in their campaign because it is now politically expedient. The JLP has come a long way from the position that “salt fish is better than education” to now having free education as part of their campaign manifesto.

One would have thought that, with being accustomed to campaign speeches from 1944, all of our Jamaican people would have learnt to think logically. But campaigning before elections has now evolved into a system where political parties need not convince the electorate if they are best organised to get its supporters on the voters’ list and to get them to vote on election day.

One would have also thought that with all of the call-in programmes that we have had on radio since the late 1960s that people would learn how to think and argue properly. But the call-in programmes are really more about individuals wanting to hear their own voices on radio than anything else.

Further, one would have thought that with fully accessible education for all since 1973, our students would have made use of this education in their childhood to think logically as adults. But our schools are really more of a collection of ‘pass-examination’ factories than institutions of genuine logical thinking.

So how do we get our people to think logically and consistently? Perhaps we need to set up logic consultancies that offer their services to the schools and even the universities.

ekrubm765@yahoo.com