When fowl cocks are fighting, millipedes should get out of their way. That is why I am not going near the coliseum where the epic duel for leadership of the Barbados Labour Party is taking place. Forgive me, but there are some things that can only be expressed using the Bajan vernacular. The late Richard Allsopp would have understood what I mean when I say that in this battle for party supremacy, there appears to be an exchange of the sexes.
Reeling under the weight of the skullduggery of others, Mia ups on Saturday and constructively dismisses her entire shadow Cabinet, replacing them with members of her “Come Near to Me Chorale”. She knows several of the elected and particularly non-elected members she appointed in February of last year are no longer in her corner so she effectively fires the whole lot and replaces them with her second string team of “just comes”, who nobody knows or is particularly impressed with. It boggles the mind how persons, the likes of Toppin, Payne, Eastmond, Forde, Clarke and Duguid can remain silent on this.
The rush to have the “just comes” endorsed as candidates was to facilitate this particular move. The hope is that when a vote for leader of the team going into battle against the Democratic Labour Party is taken, she would receive majority support among the candidates. Mia is a learned attorney and she has her own interpretation of the party’s constitution, so I will not attempt to argue with her, even though I think she is making a cardinal error.
She is trivializing the issue of candidate selection. That process ought not to be used as a weapon against one’s enemies. She is saddling the party with some candidates that simply cannot be taken seriously in this day and age. No track records in anything but bravado. It is incomprehensible for senior members of the party to be meeting candidates for the first time on the night of their endorsement. Little wonder the question was asked ‘how can I sing the lord’s song in a strange land?’
Yet this rough and tough, masculine approach to leadership is being pursued. We are also hearing of sponsorship of an updated Cole publication entitled ‘Boys in the Band’, that is about to be circulated across the land. There is no place in Barbados for that type of politics, and invariably, it always backfires on the authors and their sponsors. I predict it will so do in this particular case.
Owen, on the other hand, has chosen to take his campaign to the party’s base. He is pandering to their emotions by dangling the hope of an early return to office, so that those who sat at the table of opportunity for the past 14 years can resume their dominance. This is a classic Roman duel.
The entire drama is being played out in their favorite publication. One does her thing on Saturday for Sunday, and the other, his thing on Sunday for Monday. The economy, they both agree, is the issue of national concern and focus. Yet, in 2009, with all the economic fire power at its disposal, the party can only muster a third-string team of unknowns to articulate its economic policies and perspectives.
Three years ago the party boasted Arthur, Mascoll, Wood, Barker and a host of others “on the hill”, as economic gurus. Today, as a result of internecine strife and warfare, they offer Lynch, Gooding-Edghill and Weir. Can you believe that? These three are now the titans of economic thought and discourse in the Barbados Labour Party.
But, before the ink had dried on that declaration and the appointment of other “unknowns” to key portfolios, Arthur shot back saying he had returned to ‘save the party’. Hear Ye, Hear Ye! Draw near! The Messiah has arrived! Of the close to 310 000 souls in this country, there is only one man and one man alone capable of saving Barbados and the Barbados Labour Party from eternal shame and destruction. He has the magic formula. The Midas touch! Barbados and the Barbados Labour Party cannot survive without Owen Arthur at the helm. He and he alone can save this land. What crass arrogance! Is this what power does to you?
Arthur abandoned the ships of state and party in their most perilous hour of the past 70 years and now wants the fatted calf killed to herald his return from exile. What is he coming back to do? Reverse the policy of free bus fares for school children? Insist that small businesses pay National Insurance in tough economic times? Fight with Patrick Manning in Trinidad over fish? Bring back 3S to build three flyovers at a cost of $90 million? Award contracts similar to that granted the same 3S? Flood Barbados with more migrants than it can comfortably accommodate? Further polarize and politicize the public service? Bring a halt to the construction of hundreds of homes for deserving Barbadians? Cancel summer camps for school children? Sell large chunks of land to foreigners for the building of unsightly monstrosities? Channel all government procurement in the direction of one individual? Ignore the issue of accommodations and conditions of work for public officers? Reverse millions of dollars in subsidies and concessions granted farmers? Make it impossible for small hotels to access the tourism development fund, thereby keeping their doors open in difficult economic times? What exactly is Owen Arthur coming back to do?
Other leaders have had their day and have slipped into the political sunset. Sir Henry Forde, Sir Richard Haynes, Sir Lloyd Erskine Sandiford are all classic examples of eminent statesmen who ran their course and finished their race with dignity and aplomb. None of them was ever seen or thought to be keen on loitering around the parliament of Barbados. They all had lives before politics and they have all pursued and lived meaningful and quality lives since leaving politics.
More recently, Dame Billie Miller, Sir Louis Tull, Sir Richard Cheltenham, Philip Greaves, Maurice King, Warwick Franklin, Cyril Walker and others have all hung up their boots and given way to newer generations. Politics did not define them. They were each “somebody” before entering politics and they each have a positive mirror image of themselves now that they have left the arena.
This is the first time in recent memory that a failing and fading politician finds it so difficult to resettle in civilian life. It is as if he had plans of remaining there until death. Owen Arthur, having served his party and country with distinction in his formative years as leader, has now become a sad, sorry spectacle on the political landscape of Barbados.
We are about to witness an epic case of political-murder-suicide. The fowl cocks are in the coliseum. The battle is about to begin. No blood shall spill on me. This millipede shall watch from the safety of the stand.
(Hartley Henry is a Regional Political strategist. He can be reached at hartleyhenry@gmail.com)
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