Staff writer - Nyasha Watson
On December 29, 2011, the people of Jamaica elected the People’s National Party (PNP) to form the next government. This in effect spelt defeat for the governing Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) headed by Andrew Holness. Therefore his team is now trying to analyze where they went wrong; as the defeat was quite heavy, 41 to 22 seats based on the preliminary count.
It is no secret that Andrew Holness advertised himself as a young and different politician in order to attract the youth voters. However, based on untested statistics the majority of the youths just did not vote on Election Day, which consequently wiped out the majority of votes that Andrew Holness was counting on.
So, is it fair to say that the youths betrayed Andrew on Election Day? I would reply in the negative as one lady stated: she does not want any chicken back from Andrew. This metaphorical statement simply means that she is used to eating chicken back she now wants a change…something different from Andrew; oxtail or fish.
And this is the exact problem… while Andrew says in one breath that he is new and different in the next breath he contradicts himself by preaching continuity. Therefore, he was not engaging in conversation that would stimulate the interest of the youths. Thus, it was Bruce Golding’s bus he was just driving.
Chicken back...not an option!
So, even if a majority of the youths did vote it was not a guarantee that he was the one that they would have voted for. So, am I saying that the Portia Simpson-Miller led People’s National Party (PNP) won by default? Well, I will say that they were more balanced in their advertising; they reached out to all sectors of the population. Also, they showed the strength of the party, whereas the JLP was focused on the leader of the party.
I would like to congratulate the PNP for being the government that would lead the people of Jamaica into its 50th year of independence. I would also like to congratulate both parties on achieving a relatively violent free election. It really shows that as a nation we are maturing.
