Big cracks in small parties pact
Some minor parties to sit out next general election
Published:Sunday | September 29, 2024 | 12:09 AMErica Virtue - Senior Gleaner Writer
The National Democratic Movement (NDM), the most recognisable small party in Jamaica over the past 50 years, may not field candidates in future elections unless it emerges from its current political coma. This is the view of Michael Williams, one of the party’s founding members and its long-standing chairman.
With the Holness administration in its fifth year, Jamaicans are to head to the polls in less than a year to elect the new Government. The polls are due by September 2025.
“I don’t think we will come out of the coma in time. I don’t know if anything will change in the future. I am having a meeting [on Saturday], but where we stand right now, we’re not going to do anything,” Williams told The Sunday Gleaner on Friday as he looked at the road ahead.
He was assessing the NDM’s future and potential fielding of candidates in a political landscape dominated by the ruling Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) and the opposition People’s National Party (PNP). The JLP currently holds 47 of the island’s 63 parliamentary seats. Two – Trelawny Southern and St Ann North Eastern – are currently vacant.
The NDM was founded with much fanfare in 1995 by former Labourites, Comrades and other non-aligned members with the aim of unsettling the political status quo. But the country’s most prominent modern third party failed in its bid to wrest a single seat in the 1997 national polls, causing its then leader Bruce Golding to leave the party.
Golding returned to the JLP and led the party to victory in the 2007 general election.
Dr Christopher Tufton, who followed Golding back to the JLP, has also tasted victory at the polls since.
Dr D.K. Duncan was also re-elected to the House on his return to the PNP.
Nearly 30 years after its founding, the NDM has still not won a single parliamentary or municipal seat.
“I have always put it that we are in a coma,” Williams said on Friday. “We can either come out of the coma or we can die – and that would be a shame. We still have the ideas that made us different from the PNP and JLP, but we need a leader who will go out into the streets and push those ideas. We can’t do it by social media.
“Any leader who comes, I am willing to stand behind them, but my days of leadership are over. I can offer guidance and support,” he added.
In the 2016 polls, it had candidates in eight of the 63 parliamentary contests – Clarendon Northern (Eton Williams, won by the PNP’s Horace Dalley), Hanover Western (Leonard Sharpe, won by PNP’s Ian Hayles), St James Southern (Ras Astor Black, won by PNP’s Derrick Kellier), St Ann North Western (Graham McDonnough Jr, won by PNP’s Dr Dayton Campbell), St Catherine North Central (Lloyd Smith, won by PNP’s Natalie Neita), St Catherine South Eastern (Curtis Campbell, won by PNP’s Colin Fagan), St Andrew North Eastern (Terrence Lindo, won by JLP’s Delroy Chuck), and St Andrew North Western (Rosemarie Higgins-Campbell, won by JLP’s Derrick Smith).
The NDM did not contest the 2020 general election and also sat out the 2024 local government elections (LGEs).
In February of this year, five minor parties – the NDM, the Jamaica Patriotic Movement (JPM), the Marcus Garvey People’s Political Party (MGPPP), UP Jamaica, and Tancour United Independent Congress – announced that they were joining forces to form The Jamaica Unity Alliance (JUA), which will be dedicated to championing comprehensive constitutional change.
Williams noted ongoing disagreements among the parties, particularly regarding their desire for spokespersons to shadow current government officials. At least two parties have since left the alliance.
“We became known and respected for pushing a constitutional reform agenda. Some of what is [on the table] now, we have been [advocating for] all along. And one thing we have been saying is that we want no ceremonial president, and we want cabinet ministers not to be elected representatives,” Williams explained.
Turning back to the upcoming polls, he said: “The other parties may be fielding candidates, but they have no chance with where things stand right now.”
Some parties, such as the JPM, have indicated they never intended to field candidates.
“We are now under the umbrella of the JUA. In terms of my individual movement, no. ... We won’t be contesting the general election, but within another two [or] three weeks, we will be coming out in full force. We will be unveiling a shadow cabinet also, but not contesting elections, not the way how they set it,” the JPM’s Carlos Daley told The Sunday Gleaner.
He emphasised the need for a mass campaign to inform the public that the current political system is not working.
“We are going to have a mass campaign and we are focussing on letting our people know that this game thing does not work for them. Switching horses every five years is not helping our country. Moving towards executive presidency is what our people want,” Daley said.
In contrast, the MGPPP announced plans to field candidates for the upcoming polls.
“We will be having a conference in October and it will be very important because we will be launching our shadow cabinet. We are fully, fully, fully contesting the next election,” said Antwayne Campbell.
He said the MGPPP was looking for capable individuals, both from within and outside the alliance, to fill specific roles.
“We will be recruiting such persons and putting them in such positions once they subscribe to our policy, which is democratic nationalism,” he told The Sunday Gleaner.