Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) leader Andrew Holness is facing a possible revolt as Labourites protest against his decision not to release, in full, the findings of a special committee set up to conduct a review of the party following its blowout defeats in the 2011 and 2012 elections.
http://jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/20130224/lead/lead2.html
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Warren's Blog 
Mr “New and Different” is being as he was taught. Drunk with power! Poor Labourites!! Another decade of impotent opposition?? Christopher Tufton, where the hell are you!!!!
Mr. Sam Sharpe, Holness should organize road trips and outline his economic mission. I want the jlp to become a real conservative administration, but it is time for Holness to begin to mobilize the masses. If Holness continues on this path I will withdraw my support for the jlp and wait until a conservative party is created
The JLP hasn’t been a truly conservative party since the party was lead by Hugh Shearer. What was advocated and implemented by Edward Seaga, although it had capitalistic policies which are many times associated with conservative ideologies, totally lacked a fiscal conservative approach, needlessly doubling the country’s debt in just nine years.
Andrew Holness is quite a brainchild of Mr. Seaga. Although I applaud much of the public service of both of those men who I believe have done a lot of good, I don’t expect Mr. Holness’ running of the JLP or overall governance strategy to differ much from that of Mr. Seaga.
General Statement: I hate so much when people brag about Seaga “conservatism”. The same “conservatism” which increased our nominal debt more than any other Prime Minister (even more than Patterson and Golding). The same “conservatism” which took our debt-to-GDP ratio to over 200%. The same “conservatism” which took our budget deficit to one of its highest levels ever. I already dislike the notion of conservatism, but when people talk about “Seaga conservatism”, “Reagan conservatism”, heck I’ve even heard the travesty of “Bruce Golding conservatism”, it makes me so mad.
When will we come to the realization that Holness does not have what it takes to lead the Country?? When will it become patently clear that Holness was foisted upon the Jamaican People by the jlp hierarchy and a complicit media?? When will it become abundantly clear to Jamaicans that Christopher Tufton is what Jamaica needs to lead the Country?
Sam I am in agreement with you on that. Andrew needs to step aside.
Tufton is the man, Andrew blew his chance.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device from LIME.
We may as well stop day dreaming. Chris Tufton will probably never lead the JLP simply because he is an NDM man and Bruce Golding has made sure that any former NDM man will now have to literally walk on water and draw blood from a stone before being considered by the JLP hierarchy. Truth be told Tufton might have a better chance of winning the leadership in the PNP! Because at least there he could run for election and expect to participate in some kind of election instead of being considered by various factions and then pressured into withdrawing so only one person can end up running for “election” in the post.
It’s a sad state of affairs though. Tufton’s best bet might be to start a a new party with Dr. Peter Phillips (who also has had a rough time acquiring the leadership post in his own party, but this time entirely down to his unpopularity with the delegates compared to Portia). Being 20 years the junior of Phillips though he might have to cut a deal whereby he agrees to Phillips leading the party initially in return for support for him to take over the leadership position during a second term. The best time to have done this though would have been back between 2008 and 2010 when Phillips had been beaten again in the leadership contest for the PNP and when the Dudus fiasco and the ineligible parlimentarians were ensuring the JLP was heading back to Opposition. Back then if Tufton and Phillips had decided to leave their parties and form a new party in parliament and perhaps drawn along some capable and/or good hearted persons with them (such Mark Golding, Delroy Chuck, Ken Baugh, Peter Bunting, Fenton Ferguson, Phillip Paulwell (he’s dirty, but the man definitely is capable enough to always manage to come up with something such as competition for the old Cable and Wireless and being way more energetic than his immediate predecessors in Mining and Energy – but he supports Portia over Phillips so he would be unlikely to jump ship), Ronald Thwaites, Horace Chang (to an extent), maybe Robert Montague and Damion Crawford) they might have been able to effect a shake-up in Jamaican politics as they would have formed a third party and in one stroke put the JLP and PNP in a position of being unable to form a majority government. That might have resulted in the JLP and or PNP negotiating with this third party to form a coalition government OR (more likely I bet given Bruce’s behaviour) a dissolution of parliament and new elections. But if they had outlined a programme while in parliament to the people they might have been able to take advantage of the population’s dissatisfaction with the state of affairs in 2010 (during which polls consistently showed a third party stood a good chance of getting into parliament and perhaps even beating the JLP into becoming the second major party in parliament). During a 2010 election they might just be able to take advantage of the turmoil in the political landscape to squeak through with enough seats to form a minority government or a coalition government or maybe even a slender majority government if they could pull enough people with them. This new party could then have had Peter Phillips as PM, Tufton as Agriculture, etc and then Phillips could agree to step down as PM in favour of Tufton (in parliament) while remaining leader of the party for another year maybe during a second term starting in 2015 (with Phillips stepping down as PM in 2016).
As it stands now though Phillips would never do that as he is almost certain to become PM after Portia steps down, so he wouldn’t need to work out any political deal with Tufton.
I don’t believe Jamaicans are hungry yet for real change. I don’t believe we are hurting enough to clamour for the type of change that could bring about a better type of governance that could utlimately lead to economic growth and development in the country.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device from LIME.
I’ve always thought that the JLP’s problem is that it is being pulled in two broad directions: a populist direction and a conservative direction. Whichever faction comes out on top depends on the specific situation. But if the JLP decided to just split into a Jamaica Conservative Party (JCP) and National Labour Party (NLP) with the JCP free to focus on representing broadly unpopular views of supporting big business and not supporting any progressive social programs and the NLP free to focus on the opposite.
The JCP would of course NEVER win an election and at most gain a few seats, but at least it could have it’s views represented in parliament and the party could be free to have internal democracy as there would be no need to stymie internal democracy in the interest of retaining power for a particular cabal. It could also become a king-maker party between the PNP and NLP in situations where they end up with the same number of seats or without enough seats for a majority each.
Polls done while jlp was in power indicated that Tufton was the most trusted. This should have translated into an easy road to leadership. What did the jlp do?? They had no contest!! Now that is been an “enemy of the state”?
I have been toying with the idea of creating an organization called Jamaica Conservative Group. This organization will be the equivalent of the Teaparty. However, JCG will be require to conduct research, polling and assess the impact of macroeconomic policies on the Private Sector. I am anonymous
You just compared an organization to the Tea Party. I detest that organization already.
It is about time we get away from these “isms”! Conservatism has been long associated with the maintenance of the status quo while the others are more associated with a more socially progressive agendas. We need “Jamaicaism”, that is policies and ideas and a vision that are focused on the success of all Jamaicans. Our biggest problem is that the status quo remains and the “plantation economy” still exists, that of the continuing extraction of wealth from Jamaica. That has never been addressed by any govt, except the attempt by Michael Manley that was sabotaged.