LEADER OF Opposition Business in the House, Derrick Smith's complaint about the misplaced priorities of government ministers is not without foundation.
The campaign for the leadership of the People's National Party (PNP) is now spanning a full range of behaviour and actions from the sublime to the ridiculous.
So the nation is put through the farce of three Cabinet ministers and a former minister criss-crossing the island trying to woo and cajole about 4,000 people to vote one of them into office. In the meantime the nation's business is on hold, with Parliament not having sat since January 7, as was reported in yesterday's Gleaner.
Added to this, several of the campaign teams are being managed by Cabinet ministers. One would believe that after 15 years in the Government, the contenders' work should easily recommend the most suitable for the office. If they have to campaign so hard to convince their own partisans that they are leadership material, they should seriously question whether they are really ready for the job. This assumes of course that they are not being driven primarily by searing ambition.
As the Prime Minister himself observed at the party's special National Executive Council meeting at the Jamaica Conference Centre on Sunday, January 15, very little of what any of them has said points to any significant shift in position from what has obtained during the years of his leadership. Even if it is conceded that they would hardly openly challenge his policies while he is still in office, precious little of their pronouncements point to a vision that is primarily undergirded by a real commitment to public service.
But the party leader, Mr. Patterson, cannot escape blame for the long, drawn-out campaign his departure timetable has engendered.
Understandably he desires to leave with as many personal credits to his regime as possible but it is somewhat self-defeating to be fighting so hard after four terms in office to establish one's legacy.
With a little over a month to go before the special delegates elections to select a new party president, the nation is expected to tolerate an intensification of the campaign stumping. We would urge all persons involved not to neglect the important matters of state. Whatever the inter-connections, the national interest must come first, every time.
THE OPINIONS ON THIS PAGE, EXCEPT FOR THE ABOVE, DO NOT NECESSARILY REFLECT THE VIEWS OF THE GLEANER.
