More and more I am left to wonder if Jamaicans truly value their right or should I say privilege to vote in an election .
I then thought about it for a long time and then asked “why do we vote” ?
- We vote for “betterment” , ie we vote for a party because we believe, the party in question has demonstrated based on past experience, the will to do what is required to improve the general economic conditions in the country and so doing improve our lives.
- We vote for this party because we came and saw our parents voting for them so we just continued the tradition.
- We vote for this party because we are die-hard supporters and we love this party for life.
- We vote for this party because of the area we live, doing otherwise could be a death sentence.
- We vote for this party because, we don’t “like” the alternative.
- We vote for this party, because when they are in office, we get a chance to “eat a food”.
- We vote for the party in question, because we are convinced that the slate of candidate they have placed before us appears to be competent given their track record. We are also convinced that the polices they have enunciated in their manifesto, will lead to economic wealth for the country and as such I will benefit in the long run.
- We vote for the party in question because we were paid to do so .
Now depending on the reason for your vote, you can decide if your vote was wasted given the outcomes you are seeing . In some cases there are simply no expectations, so whatever comes, we just roll with it because ” me done get weh mi fi get already” ( Those paid to vote)
I don’t think anyone who votes, does so to face increased hardship, belt tightening, increased taxes, lower or frozen wages, devaluation, corruption, increased crimes, poor health service, poor fire services, bad roads, no water, sub standard educational system and increased benefits for parliamentarians .
I also don’t think when we vote , we do so to have our voices ignored, for people to tell us to take it or leave it, for our parliamentarians to pass law that infringes on our rights as set out by those who originally framed the constitution.
Neither do I believe that when we vote, we give our elected leaders the freedom to sign agreements that brings no significant benefits to the country, or do we do so to allow them to sell out our assets to the highest bidder regardless of the long-term consequences of the country.
If I am even 80% right in my assertion above, about the things we did NOT vote for, why do we accept them ?
This is a very serious question and one that we all need as individuals to take a serious look at. Collectively, we then need to take a stand that these elected leaders either lay out a comprehensive plan and take steps necessary to deliver what we expect, or risk being removed from office, by the will of the people.
I do believe in the democratic process, but at the same time I do not believe that if failure is imminent after only 18-24 months of a party being elected, we the people should sit and bite our nails and wait another 36 months for them to drive the “nails” in the coffin.
This is a call to action by the people of Jamaica least we all fail and those who can run, will run and leave those of us who cannot run behind.
Filed under: Corruption, Crime, Economics |
Warren's Blog 
people also vote because of a sense of affiliation with a person. Some may vote for Portia because she is a woman. Some may vote for Damion Crawford because he is a rasta. Some may have voted for PJ or Obama because they were black and would be the first.
That’s another interesting angle. I welcome other ideas as this could help form the basis of how we move forward from here.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device from LIME.
Jamaican politics is just pathetic. In America, people can give you tons of reasons why they voted for the Democratic Party or the Republicans. In Jamaica, people vote mainly on their emotions at the time. However, the views of people like CullCull do not surprise me. Although, it is a well known fact that the party of Norman Manley has has lost its way, many people are still of the view that the Party is still holding true to its fundamental beliefs. Furthermore, people like CullCull voted for the jlp in 2007 and Bruce Golding disappointed them. Therefore, due to their disappointment they re-elected the pnp. This is very strange because the previous pnp administration was very incompetent, but the electorate continued to elect the pnp, citing that the jlp had internal feuds; hence the party was not ready for leadership and many people did not like Edward Seaga’s style. So the electorate was willing to elect an administration which was known for corruption and incompetence, because there was a popularly held view that the jlp was not ready to govern the country. Fast-Forward to 2007, the people decided to elect the intellectually superior Bruce Golding, who performed relatively well in a previous debate, he received props when he declared that he had no interest in Garrison politics and the JLP was all about Garrison politics. Furthermore, the media with the exception of pro-jlp columnist Dawn Ritch had a pro-Bruce Golding stance. It was not surprising when Bruce Golding was declared the victor in the 2007 general elections. For the first time in several decades, Jamaica had a leader who was able to mobilize the country around national objectives. During, Mr.Golding’s first term he performed reasonable well, we know that America shared this view because of the release of Wikileak – a diplomatic cable. In addition, Golding’s administration created the blueprint for a number of long term plans, like The Caymanas Economic Zone and the Logistics Hub Initiative. Unfortunately, the Dudus Saga destroyed Golding’s reputation and his credibility. According to Mr. Golding, his actions were determined by legal principles; but many Jamaicans saw him as a deceptive politician who was trying to protect a JLP strongman and in the long term his actions damaged Jamaica’s already waning credibility. Since, the pnp has a populist nature and being a post slavery society the pnp’s redistributive policies found favour with the electorate. The electorate had too much confidence in Mr.Golding, and he failed to translate his rhetoric into policy and Jamaica has a pro pnp stance unfortunately, so most persons were willing to dash the jlp for a party with a history of failure. These persons used some of Manley’s more successful policies and some social programmes of Mr.Patterson to justify their reason for electing the pnp. The last general election had nothing to do with policy, the voice of Mr.Golding’s disappointed fans spoke. Conversely, I do not think that it is wise to share the view that the jlp did a lot of damage in four years; because the previous administration was more incompetent. For example during the previous pnp administration four year tenure; the country witnessed a plethora of scandals, these scandals include: Shell waiver Saga, Furniture Scandal, Zinc Scandal and the Sand Mining Scandal among others; but the electorate expected change with the Messianic coming of Bruce Golding, but since he didn’t deliver the Jamaican electorate decided to forge ties with a party whose philosophy they understood. Unlike the pnp, the jlp has never truly articulated its conservative ideals to which I subscribe, so people decided to support a party which they understood and the pnp in return pretends to understand them. But it is still my firm believe that the jlp is superior to the pnp and the present administration is incompetent. However, the JLP will not become an alternative to the pnp until its internal problems are solved and the party is rebranded. There is hope in Jamaica, because I have a number of policies to transform Jamaica and some of them are published in the form of letters to the editor. I can change this country if given the opportunity.
One of your best post to date. If you want to have the opportunity to implement your ideas, you must first learn to LISTEN. You are very quick to dismiss other peoples’ ideas, without giving any thought as to what they are saying. This translates to a certain level of arrogance that Jamaicans have little tolerance of.
The thing you have to realize quickly is that injecting foreign concepts such as conservative and fiscal conservative is not something that will play well in Jamaica. No matter how many good concepts you can come up with, if you do not put yourself in a position where you can suggest and ultimately implement those concepts, then they are useless. Another blogger gave you some good advice, but knowing you your simply dismiss them outright.
The other thing I realize is that you haven’t come to the realization that there is not much difference between the PNP and the JLP. In fact, if you compare the background of the JLP MPs with those of the PNP, you see a vast differences as far as accomplishments. At this point in time, the PNP have a larger core group of younger MPs and the party leadership is busy speaking about succession planning, a concept foreign to the JLP. The older heads within the PNP will be gone in the next 5-years and you will see the younger group exerting their influence and broadening the sphere of influence beyond gutter politics. if you look at the decimated JLP, apart from one or two individuals on the horizon, are there groups of individuals with some core competencies to assume the role of the Leader of the party?
You pathway to public service must begin by grasping basic concepts and fine tune your understanding on how a diverse set of people think on normal situations. Just base on your many posts on this forum, your dismissive attitude will get you no where fast. I think you lack the people’s skill to be even taken seriously. The first thing you need to understand is that you can learn from ANYONE, even the illertates among us. The sooner you realize this, the sooner you will start that journey to greatness. Start by learning how to listen keenly to what others have to say and being able to “pick sense out of nonsense”. Your ability to synthesize inputs from diverse sources will go a far way in you being electable. Some of the “smartest” Jamaicans I have met in life cannot even read and write, yet they are adept at getting things done (even achieving great wealth) by working through others.
Why are you judging why people vote and if it is wasted ?. isn’t democracy about the will of the people. Just like how the teachers voted for Doran Dixon. The people have spoken.. why should others say it is wasted
How often have you heard people say, – I am sorry I did so and so or If me did know me would never.
But to your assertion :
My exact words were ” you can decide if your vote was wasted given the outcome of what you are seeing”.
I never said or implied that I was the “judge” of your vote.
Please don’t misquote me.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device from LIME.
Seems like your views are best served in a country like Egypt
Let’s hear yours, it would add to the discussion, don’t you think so?
So advance yours given what I have outlined above in terms of expectations when people vote.
Surely you must have some expectations and you can also comment on whether or not your expectations, when you voted have been met or not.
I would love a honest and frank discussion on this one and her bloggers personal views.
Well one votes, typically the most immediate needs are placed first. And how you think they are being served. During the last election, our debt surpassed 1 trillion dollars, no IMF deal was in sight. I personally was disenchanted with what happenned in the four years JLP were in power, I had high expectations and they were dashed.
The PNP opened doors for many ordinary people in giving them the opportunity to own a car ( deportee), gain tertiary education . Most voting age people can use that as a reference point, as most are now too young to understand the politics of the 70ies and 80ies
I didn’t vote, mainly because neither party seemed worth going through the hassle of getting enumerated for.
A flyer listing some of the past achievements and intended goals of the PNP candidate was left outside my door. It was laughable, the sort of thing you might expect of a guy running for student council president, not member of parliament. The JLP candidate on the other hand did not even do that. Consequently, I had no idea what he planned to do and therefore could not vote for him. At least I could critique and make suggestions to the PNP candidate. Yet by running on the PNP’s ticket that candidate was essentially signalling his belief in PSM, which to me was quite unreasonable.
When the PNP candidate won, I was not displeased – indifferent maybe, but not displeased – he might have shown poor judgement but he had also shown some interest.
So my expectations were tempered. I had no particular expectation of competence in my MP and a clear expectation of incompetence in our PM. Since then I have been pleasantly surprised on a number of occasions. Whether these actions are prompted by the IMF or not is not that important, the thing is they have happened. Peter Philips has handled the portfolio as well as any of his predecessors in the last 20 years. I am pleased that there seems to be some move to shake up the health sector where a number of consultants/senior doctors have been exploiting the system. I am pleased that there is some attempt to restructure the education sector – I am firmly of the belief that we would be better off if we paid teachers more, demanded more from them, desisted from hiring incompetents and closed those loop holes that allowed persons benefits that were not commiserate with their performance.
I am also pleased with PSM’s performance. She has probably been the best performer of this administration. While so many others criticize her for not speaking, I think that she is handling her role well. She has avoided saying anything potentially damaging as far as I am aware and has allowed her ministers to handle the difficult things. Meanwhile she has attended many events speaking to no doubt enthusiastic audiences who have welcomed her speeches. She has done what she does well and allowed others to do the things that she does not do so well. Finally, she has allowed Dr. Philips to reign in her desire to give away everything!
On the other hand I remain disappointed that Kern Spencer is not yet in jail; Ian Lloyd’s killer was not prosecuted; the cops who framed the guy in St. Catherine over a stick of ganja are not being prosecuted; Kentucky Kid’s killers remain at large; and that we have a DPP who seems to be of the belief that the general population is more concerned about the details of the law than the outcome. I am a software developer and I cannot tell any of my clients that their program does not work because of choices I made, or because the task was difficult. I would have lost my client.
I am very disappointed that the GoJ has stuck to attrition as its preferred means of shrinking the public sector rather than taking aim at the lazy and or incompetent. This in my opinion is a particularly sore point.
I remain amazed that JUTC and NSWMA – two of the largest feeding trees in Jamaica remain untamed.
Absent from your list is the role of class and color plays in our Political areana. Believe it or not, the average Jamaican perceives the JLP is a party that cares for the rich and upper class Jamaican, who happen to be predominantly white/brown Jamaican. The other side has exploited this perception to their benefit. They do it in a very subtle and subliminal way, suggesting that “one of us” needs to be in the driver’s seat in order to get to the promise land.
I remember looking at a Observer article some years ago, where a Jamaica Financial Team was meeting with some individuals from the US. The picture present an image that would shock our conscience. Not a single Black Jamaican was in that room. We can speak of economical factor and other indicators,but we carry psychological scars/baggage as it relates to race and class in this country. Not surprising that we see so many of our Jamaicans bleaching their skin, even at the risk of causing permanently damaged. Interesting enough, despite all that we have accomplished over the years, bleaching is more widespread today than it was 20-30 years ago. In other words, we are regressing.
Then there is the issue of the 80/20 rule. I think 80% of the electoral base is committed to one party or the other and the chances of one party wining an election rest with the other 20%. The bottom line is, as far as winning elections are concerned, the PNP is a lot more organized than the JLP and as we speak, they are in the trenches registering new voters and targeting seats they think they can win come 2016. Don’t be surprise if they pickoff another 4-6 seats when the next election rolls around. We can talk all we want, our voters weigh other non-tangible issues heavily and it does not boil down to breach or butter issue. I doubt Andrew Holness father voted for his own son in the last election (despite his claim that he would), since he is a diehard PNP supporter, who has never voted for the JLP his entire life. Hatred for the other side is what drives 80% of the voting population and most voters are conditioned by their parents/immediate relatives by the time they reach adulthood.
the JLP held on to Seaga well past his shelf life. PJ rode in with black man time, so for a while that resonated. Portia also comes in with woman time. I guess JLP can come with Brown man time now ( bleach or otherwise).. but I don’t think that would be a good strategy
Selfishness is what drives the votes of many people as it is more about the immediate perceived personal benefits than what would be in the best interest of the Country. Whenever we can get to the point to thinking that “A rising tide lifts all boats” and accept the converse that a sinking ship takes everybody down(unless lifeboats are available) then nothing will change. The “security companies” and the burglar bar manufacturers will continue to grow wealthy as we continue to be held prisoners in our own Country. We need leadership that can galvanize support behind a common vision that moves Jamaica forward, not clowns, sycophants and charlatans who have ruined this Country. Peter Phillips and Christopher Tufton are the only two from the current crop who have the “testicles” required to transform.