Some stalwarts stayed, big names got bumped and the Jamaica Labour Party, JLP, lost out in a race that some had said was too close to call and some called. The December 29 2011, Jamaican General Election, spelt defeat for the JLP and victory for the Peoples National Party, PNP.
There were shades of other campaigns when the JLP drew the crowds to the public meetings and conferences but couldn’t translate that at the ballot box.
It’s like having a party and inviting 100 people who tell you they are absolutely, definitely coming and finding yourself picking at soggy sandwiches, with the ten people who did come, but can’t stay long.
The party with free education up to secondary level and which introduced free healthcare lost out to an opposition that campaigned as the caring people’s party.
It should have gone so different some say, if the JLP had spent more time talking up the positives rather than talking the negatives of the PNP. It is either they did not get that message across or for some reason the electorate didn’t care that much or the new JLP leader inherited too much political baggage to really make a fresh start.
Political ads by the youth arm of the JLP; G2k went for the PNP leader, Portia Simpson Miller’s jugular but didn’t hit a major artery.
Attacking PNP leader Portia Simpson – Miller is the political equivalent of taking a bat to a Panda.
In attacking Portia did G2k inadvertently push the ahh… button in people’s minds…?
What the ads definitely did was put Portia Simpson Miller and her party people front and vaguely left of centre in people’s minds night after night.
Some attack ads trumpeted (sic) that the JLP leader, young and vibrant intelligent, Andrew Holness (and he is) did not need papers to read from when he spoke. Maybe he should have used them to remind him not to suggest that you don’t need intellectuals.
Many of us don’t really know what intellectuals are talking about when they speak, even with a dictionary or Google, we just know they serve some mysterious purpose and bad things happen when countries turn against the intellectuals.
The JLP also complained about the media but perhaps it should have kept that private and grinned and not bared it for all to see in the photo op. As Oscar Wilde is said to have said, the only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about, seems to have worked for Portia.
There is off course a lot more to the election, the results and the message the people sent the politicians on both sides, some obvious some not so. The JLP will as it has said be reflecting on this as it moves into the opposition and rebuilding mode in the New Year.
