You cannot reward failure and poor judgement
People’s National Party President Portia Simpson Miller and the Jamaica Observer editorial board appear to be in one accord in relation to the prospects of Lisa Hanna attaining a higher leadership position within the party. “Your time will come,” they intone in the wake of an eye-opening delegates’ vote, even as the editorial of Monday, September 19, 2016 was so much more expansive.
That might be true; Hanna’s time may indeed come in the future, but the delegates of Norman Washington Manley’s party have certainly sent a salutary message to all who would be humble and soul-searching enough to acknowledge and take to heart: You cannot reward and elevate failure.
How do I mean? Well, let us consider the following.
First, at the constituency level. Hanna was gifted the best constituency, bar none, in all of Jamaica, the only one in which the citizens have voted one way, and one way only, from the beginning in 1944. It is not a constituency that is prone to prolonged bickering, not even when the son of the revered late Dr Ivan Lloyd was yanked from his studies in the United Kingdom in the late 1960s to contest the seat, unsuccessfully of course, on a Jamaica Labour Party ticket against the irrepressible Seymour “Foggy” Mullings.
And yet, Hanna has displayed the kind of (non)leadership in this hitherto politically pristine constituency that has led to three out of four councillors in the place being totally against her and not communicating with her, thereby taking the constituency into an unknown negative, tension-filled territory.
And, lest we forget, the Office of the Contractor General has recently strongly signalled that the constituency and the council of the garden parish have serious questions to answer in his ongoing probe into irregularities concerning the spending of public funds. Of course, such allegations may or may not turn out to be true, but they do not appear to attach to any other constituency in the parish.
Second, Hanna was, during the recent general election campaign, the regional chairperson for St Ann and Trelawny. Right next to her traditionally strong St Ann South Eastern constituency is the constituency of St Ann South Western, then held by the PNP. The regional chairperson, turning steadfastly away from St Ann South Western, chose to campaign at length in Trelawny Southern, held by the JLP.
The outcome? St Ann South Western losing by a mere 200-plus votes and the PNP’s losing margin in Trelawny Southern the worst since the constituency came into being.
So that, weighed in the balance at the constituency, parish and regional levels, the political stewardship of the aspirant is found seriously wanting.
As far as political astuteness and judgement are concerned, Hanna had failed the test. How then is it possible for the voter delegate not to consider it passing strange that he is being urged to reward failure of this sort with promotion, elevation, for her to occupy one of the second-tier presidential positions in the party, no less?
None of the other four aspirants is perfect; they all fall within the family of Homo sapiens — like all of us, imperfect. But none of them is afflicted by this lack of political astuteness, or saddled with this unfortunate show of poor judgement. And so, is there then any surprise that, by their vote, the delegates sent forth a strong, sharp rebuke?
There is, too, good reason to look beyond the parochial and the regional to consider service rendered at the national level to try to discern whether such service has been so outstanding as to trump that poor political contribution, erasing that quite unhappy political rÃ&Copy;sumÃ&Copy;.
Stripped of everything else, there is no evidence that her stint as minister of youth served to inspire many young voters to cast their vote for our party, the PNP, as the preferred choice.
Lesson learnt
Manley’s party could never be seen openly to reward failure. The delegates set the examination, they mark the papers, and they are the ones who make the grades known.
The delegates say that if you want to be elevated within the PNP, solid expression of sound political work, over time, constitutes the core of the subject matter on which the examination is set. You ought not to seek to persuade me, a delegate, to reward proven failure in that field.
That is, of course, a lesson, an inescapable rule of renewal, whatever course that renewal is to take.
There is no denying that the PNP is now travelling through a corridor of change. We are duty-bound to emerge from that corridor vowing once again to abide by one of the party’s hallowed principles, which is, never to reward failure with promotion.
That is one of the lasting messages from the vote that was taken as the 78th anniversary of the People’s National Party came upon us. Lisa Hanna’s day may come, as is projected. But surely, the first step in moving towards that glorious day must be for her to set about healing those debilitating political wounds that afflict the St Ann South Eastern constituency.
The dance must certainly begin at home. That message of wholesome dancing at the home base, coming out of last Saturday’s vote, is therefore also obviously directed at the party as part of the platform of positive change. Renewal cannot mean rewarding and encouraging failure.
So, curiously enough, the delegates have used the unhappy circumstances that existed in our party at the moment of its 78th anniversary to begin again to openly demonstrate what must be done to meet the political demands that are set.
And for that task, dedicated toil in the vineyard, tact, selflessness and a loving engaging spirit are essential ingredients: tools that always help in any sustained effort to meet those demands. Seymour “Foggy” Mullings would have told us so. We who have ears to hear, let us hear!
A J Nicholson is a former senator and Cabinet minister in the People’s National Party administrations. Send comments to the Observer or nicholsonaj1@gmail.com.