News yesterday that a recount of the votes in St Mary South Eastern led to a reversal of fortunes in that marginal constituency has set the cat among the pigeons in unmistakeable fashion.

A three-seat majority for the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) at the end of the preliminary count in Thursday’s parliamentary election was already far too close for comfort, so far as Mr Andrew Holness and his party were concerned. Now, with the tedious recounts ongoing, and the possibility of magisterial recounts pending, a one-seat majority becomes doubly difficult.

At this point it could well be that there are some in the hierarchy of the People’s National Party (PNP) believing that now is a good time to be in Opposition; and hoping there is not another reversal in their favour.

Now, as much as at any other time in modern Jamaica, our political parties, their leaders, faithful party supporters, and the wider population must act with maximum maturity and responsibility, always placing country first.

As was pointed out in this space yesterday, any claim to a mandate after last Thursday’s election is limited not just by the very thin seat majority and the fact that the two parties have ended up close to level in vote count. Perhaps even more to the point is the reality that more than half of the voting population chose to stay away.

Of course, there are many older Jamaicans who will question the extent to which high voter turnouts of the past were really as high as the recorded figures suggest. For while Jamaica’s electoral system is today the envy of many countries, there was a time when bogus voting, and voter fraud in general, were major problems in Jamaican elections — perhaps not to the extent of deciding which party formed Government, but enough to cause worrying distortions.

That said, the 47.7 per cent turnout on Thursday was extremely disappointing, reflecting the growing and much-talked-about cynicism among potential electors.

There is sound basis for a lot of that cynicism. Much of it has its basis in perceived corruption and inefficiencies in governance. However, it seems to this newspaper that, at ground level, competing politicians and political parties have much to answer for.

Let’s be clear. Those individuals who openly make vulgar demands to be paid for their vote do so because they know it is happening. There are politicians who pay people to vote as well as to withhold their votes — ‘if you not going to vote for me, don’t vote for the other party’.

Anecdotal evidence suggests that some politicians hand out cash to their supporters — purportedly to cover meals and other expenses — to board their meeting-bound buses and even to be part of the crowd on nomination day. Many who used to do volunteer work for their party in order to get voters to the polling station, for instance, must now be paid to do so.

As passionate party loyalties have waned with the passage of time, so have politicians felt it necessary to use cash to incentivise.

Inevitably then, there is a loss of respect for the political process, even among those who are immediate cash beneficiaries. This growing trend to eschew ethics and morality in the effort to win elections will undermine the Jamaican democracy.