‘Watch yuh back’ - Former PNP MP sympathises with De La Haye for quitting politics after threat

A FORMER member of parliament has opened up about some of the measures that were employed to keep her safe amid a slew of death threats over the four years she served as a lawmaker.

Heather Robinson, the one-term parliamentary representative for what was then St Catherine South Central, recounted that the threats against her life were based on police intelligence, “political intelligence” and “people’s behaviour”. None of the threats, she acknowledged, was made directly or by telephone.

But they were credible enough that at one point, she was assigned two police bodyguards, Robinson recalled.

“And when I couldn’t go home, I had to go to the police station and wait on the police to escort me home. Certain areas I couldn’t go [and sometimes] when I’m going home, I have to talk to me friend dem [on the phone] from start ‘til when I reach home or when the service got disrupted,” she told The Sunday Gleaner in an interview last Friday.

“Sometimes you really just sort of close your eyes to it, you know. You are told not drive a particular place and you are not to go to a particular place. It was awful,” Robinson said, before adding, “I could a write a book pan dat.”

The disclosures come days after political newcomer Dr Winston De La Haye reportedly surprised senior People’s National Party (PNP) officials when he announced on social media that he was stepping down as the party’s standard-bearer for the constituency of St Catherine East Central, citing a threat against his life.

Several communities that were part of the former St Catherine South Central constituency now fall under St Catherine East Central, which is represented by the Jamaica Labour Party’s (JLP) Alando Terrelonge.

De La Haye, a medical doctor by profession, has not commented publicly since his resignation. He also did not respond to several questions posed by The Sunday Gleaner on Friday.

Anonymous Call

But according to party insiders, De La Haye has told the top brass of the PNP that two Fridays ago, he got an anonymous call on his cell phone. According to one insider, he indicated that the caller warned him that “they want to tek him out so him must watch him back”.

Further, the medical doctor reportedly surmised, during a meeting with party officials, that the threat was from PNP factions “within the constituency”.

However, one insider noted that De La Haye has not provided any details.

“The party don’t know what to do because he didn’t really have anything to back it up beyond just an anonymous threat saying, ‘watch yuh back’.”

“Other than that, he had no more information. He doesn’t know where it is coming from. Nobody knows.”

Another PNP activist disclosed, too, that the party was caught off guard by De La Haye’s announcement on Twitter, especially since there were a flurry of meetings, including one with the constituency executive, to try and resolve the issues.

“When he came out and issue that resignation on Twitter, it caught everybody by ambush,” the activist fumed.

PNP General Secretary Julian Robinson declined to comment on De La Haye’s resignation, but said the party is “speaking to a number of people to identify a suitable replacement”.

East Central St Catherine and North East Manchester are the two constituencies without a PNP standard-bearer, he confirmed.

In the 1993 general election, Heather Robinson, the PNP candidate, polled 7,548 votes to defeat her Jamaica Labour Party challenger Allie McNab by more than 3,000 votes. But a public declaration after her electoral victory that she would have nothing to do with criminal elements triggered a tussle with Donovan ‘Bulbie’ Bennett, a feared gang leader who was believed to be a PNP supporter.

In late 1993 and early 1994, Robinson complained in the House of Representatives that her life had been threatened, and by June 1996, she walked away from representational politics. Bulbie was shot and killed by the security forces during a predawn operation in Clarendon in October 2005.

“The reason why I stuck it out for so long is because I grew up in politics, but after a time, you decide that you just can’t manage any more because it doesn’t just affect you, it affects your family, the people you work with … . It affects a whole heapa people around you,” she explained.

Though she understands De La Haye’s decision to walk, Robinson believes he folded too quickly.

“I think he could have exercised a little patience, but as I said, everybody knows their tolerance level,” she said. “Everybody responds to situations differently. So, whereas some of us would have endured for a time, others decide that they do not have that endurance.”

The former MP believes political loyalists can become “dangerous and destructive” when their attempts to gain power and influence within constituency organisations are rejected.

“What will happen over time is that some of the best people who can represent us will refuse to come forward.”

livern.barrett@gleanerjm.com