Mark Wignall | The election engine begins humming now

A strong view held by some in the People’s National Party (PNP) is, “My feeling is the PM will call for the general election soon, either in February or March. The current administration has lost its budget czar, Dr Nigel Clarke, to the warm and welcoming arms of the International Monetary Fund (IMF).”

Let’s face it. If anyone or any entity associated with the IMF derives pleasure from such association, then certainly it ought to be those creating and tweaking fiscal policies of all sorts. By that reasoning, we will expect Dr Clarke to be much happier in the IMF than he was while crafting financial policy under the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) administration.

The PNP viewpoint also stresses that, “Though great faith is placed in the current Minister of Finance Fayval Williams, she is a bit in over her head. With the economy contracting last year and major expenditures needed in education, health, infrastructure and cost-of-living assistance, it will be a huge challenge to create a good budget.

“If the PM calls the election before the budget needs to be passed and the JLP loses the election, well then, the budget becomes the PNP’s problem. And, if the PNP cannot come up with a solid, well-received budget, then the JLP can immediately go on the offensive and attack the PNP for poor management.

“The obverse is that, if the JLP wins, they create some room to manoeuvre. But, if the JLP presents a budget the public despise, they will lose the election by a landslide.”

IS MURDER DECLINE GOOD RETURN ON INVESTMENT?

Murders declined in 2024, according to Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF) statistics. Under most circumstances, that is great. But one caveat, don’t begin the big parade yet. A question worth asking is, is the decline in murders for 2024 a good return on the investment? The current administration has spent a huge sum of money in the last few years on increasing the size of the JCF; new vehicles for the JCF, new technology for the JCF, new police stations for the JCF; and modernising the JCF in every fashion.

We can hold that close to our chest and say, somewhat subdued, that it wasn’t a bad job. But, let us travel on reality street. The public is not exactly ready to sip from the congratulatory cup. Many of our people are still quite weary of the JCF. Has trust in the JCF improved? Do the people of Jamaica believe the JCF is up to the job?

There is much more to be done. For Jamaicans to feel safe, the murder rate must decline quite a bit more. At least another 700 murders a year, if not more. That may appear to be a huge lift but our baseline numbers were already too high for comfort. Jamaica needs to be consistently at about 350 murders per year for us to reclaim any new solace or semblance of being seen as safe and consistently secure.

PM HOLNESS CLIMBING DOWN FROM HIGH HORSE

In one breath, it came across almost like a supplication; the prime minister pleading with us as he admitted that the allocation for road repairs, six billion dollars, is not nearly enough. This approach must be placed alongside plain political lying.

In the political campaign of 2002 when the PNP under P.J. Patterson was coming to the end of its multiple-wins politics, Bobby Pickersgill, minister of works, in an eruption of political mendacity, promised the people that “Jamaica will be pothole free by 2003”. The cheap rhyme was a dead giveaway.

At this time, autoparts retailers are making super profits. The PM knows that the state of our roads is in the catastrophe phase in the rush to total breakdown. Potholes and deliberately driving dangerously to get ahead of traffic, slowed down by sharp edges 12-inch deep holes, will always be a recipe for disaster.

“Now, since July, since the passage of Hurricane Beryl, we have provided approximately $3 billion for REACH (Relief Emergency Assistance and Community Help) Programme, another $2 billion for emergency (road repairs), and we have provided through the ... constituency mitigation programme another $1.5 billion.

“So, we have rapidly and significantly increased the budget for road maintenance; you’re looking at about $6 billion now ..., but I’d be the first to tell you that $6 billion is not enough,” the prime minister reported.

After pleading with the people to exercise patience, he said, “There’s a notion in our minds that, back in the days when the roads were built with the broken stones, it lasted for 40 years.

“That may be the case 40 years ago when you only had 80,000 cars in Jamaica, when you didn’t have heavy trucks, and the weather was understood and stable. Today, it is a totally different user environment for our roads,” Holness pointed out, stating the hard facts.

PNP NEVER APOLOGISED

After the PNP won (again) in 2002, Dr Omar Davies, then finance minister at a constituency get-together in early 2003, reported to them and the nation that political spending could not be checked or slowed down with an election pending. That was the infamous and most fiscally reckless ‘run wid it’ speech.

I don’t recall any apology, any well-expressed contrition from Dr Davies. And, in the days when 2003 rolled around and the potholes on Jamaican roads came close to entering our culture, Bobby Pickersgill’s party, the PNP, enjoyed all of the power but shared little, if any, of the responsibility of the poor roads, the accidents and the mounting costs to the driver.

Ah, it was just another trick on the politically gullible and barely deserved, another belly laugh among many.

Prime Minister Holness may just be getting his history right. The prime minister said the expected life of the roads that we are going to build (under SPARK) is between seven and 15 years.

“I want everyone to appreciate that; that the expected life of the road before major maintenance is needed would be between seven and 15 years,” With the absence of a rhyme, that is more believable.

Mark Wignall is a political and public affairs analyst. Send feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com and mawigsr@gmail.com.