Hurricane Melissa’s malicious rampage through wester n Jamaica in late October last year must have been extremely close and personal for general secretary of the Opposition People’s National Party (PNP) Dr Dayton Campbell. That’s because the eye of the Category 5 storm made landfall in his constituency of Westmoreland Eastern. It left a trail of death and destruction across the western region before eventually exiting the island over Trelawny.

Dr Campbell was reported last week as saying that, in Westmo reland Eastern, 40 per cent of the houses are still covered by tarpaulin, while schools, health centres, and roads remain badly damaged.

“There is a lot of work still to be done,” he said.

That last is true not only of his constituency and wider Westmoreland, but most of western Jamaica, and in some cases much farther east — such was the effect of the strongest recorded hurricane to have hit Jamaica.

In a real sense, then, the PNP, which lost the general election of a year ago to the ruling Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) — 35 to 28 — may have struck gold by deciding to hold the public session of its 88th annual national conference in Westmoreland.

That’s the first ever outside of Jamaica’s capital Kingston as far as we are aware.

Explaining the move to Savanna-la-Mar following private business sittings in Kingston, party President Mr Mark Golding framed it squarely in the context of the hurricane.

“[I]t’s really just to show solidarity and gratitude to the people of Westmoreland in their struggle to get through this terrible hurricane and the aftermath,” Mr Golding told the Jamaica Observer.

Also, it is surely not lost on anyone that in the 2025 polls the PNP reasserted traditional dominance in Westmoreland following disaster in 2020 when it lost all three seats there.

Obviously, the perceived slow pace of recovery from hurricane damage in the west has provided rich fodder for the PNP as it strives to reassert itself as a viable alternative Government-in-waiting.

Lest we forget, the JLP’s victory last year was its third straight, an unprecedented achievement for that party — albeit with a much-reduced majority.

Without doubt, that result was an improvement for the PNP following 2020 when that party, then led by Dr Peter Phillips, suffered a landslide defeat to Dr Andrew Holness’s JLP — 14 to 49.

But even after its substantial improvement in seat count last September, the PNP will continue to feel the pressing need to affirm its relevance. This, in an age when politicians and our liberal democratic political processes are increasingly being viewed with scepticism.

That need for not just the PNP, but also the JLP to show relevance, was underlined by the shocking voter turnout last year. After what felt like an enthusiastic response to political representatives by supporters during an upbeat, high-octane campaign, the Electoral Office reported the turnout at 39.96 per cent of the 2,077,800 people registered to vote.

That was just two percentage points better than the 37.85 percentage turnout in 2020 at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.

It seems to us that in today’s Jamaica, not just our politicians, but leadership at all levels, should, as a matter of urgency, strive to convince everyone — not just party loyalists — that our political system and processes make sense.