Dear Editor,

I heard People’s National Party (PNP) President Peter Phillips say, while speaking at a PNP rally in Annotto Bay, St Mary, that the by-election in St Mary South Eastern was a veritable referendum on the governance of the Jamaica Labour Party Government led by Prime Minister Andrew Holness.

Well, I wonder if after the dust settles and he comes to realise that his party has lost in those polls if he will feel the same way.

To start off, I believe that Phillips was disingenuous to suggest that any of the three by-elections could have been seen as a referendum on any sitting Government when his party had held control of all three constituencies that were holding by-elections.

He ought to have used the opportunity to be guided by his constituents and work to reinforce his presence in the various communities.

The sad thing is that too many politicians still believe that the people of Jamaica do not think, and so go about saying anything from campaign platforms with confidence there is no fact-checking. Both political parties are guilty of this.

The time has come for us to realise that the people of Jamaica deserve more and those who seek to lead must come to the platform with intelligent, unskewed conversation.

The years of an electorate that lines up at the polls on election day as mindless sheep are — hopefully — burned in the incinerator of corruption and pork barrel politics.

As the losing candidates lick their wounds, both party presidents must now decide where they will take the people they lead. Holness spouts words of the land of prosperity, but the silence on the seemingly derailed “5 in 4” campaign tells another story. Where is Michael Lee Chin and his band of prosperity crusaders?

For Phillips, I hope the road he takes does not lead us to the mountaintop. The PNP already did that, and because it was not a fully thought-out plan some people are still stuck on that mountain. Phillips seems hell-bent on a socialism path, but I dare say that Andrew Holness’s youth, modernity and “$1.5-million tax break” will beat that every time.

If there remains any talk of these elections being a referendum it must be that the people not living in the areas of political exclusion (in this case St Mary South Eastern) have ratified their support for the efforts of the JLP Government. Holness’s team must now remember that to whom much is given, much is expected, and the people are watching to see what is done with the hand the voters have dealt.

The people in St Andrew Southern and St Andrew South Western lost an opportunity to see what can happen when people want more. Let us hope their new Members of Parliament will take them where the retiring stalwarts couldn’t in the decades they held the seat.

Referendum? What say you, Sir Peter?

Afronose

bigzy_2000@yahoo.com