Dr Blythe to meet with independents over PNP resignation
Published:Thursday | July 13, 2023 | 12:07 AMMark Titus/Senior Gleaner Writer
FORMER PEOPLE’S National Party (PNP) government minister, Dr Karl Blythe, is to meet with the three independent councillors of the Westmoreland Municipal Corporation (WMC) who recently resigned from the PNP in protest over the selection of Ian Hayles as the standard-bearer for the Western Westmoreland constituency.
“As a life member of the NEC (National Executive Council) and a senior man in the parish, I believe it is my duty to meet with my younger colleagues and discuss with them with a view of finding out what the problem is through their eyes,” said Dr Blythe, a former PNP member of parliament (MP), on Tuesday.
“I am meeting with them to hear their concerns and I will tell them how I feel and how I think they can proceed.”
Blythe is rejecting the suggestion that he was assigned by the party hierarchy to convince the men to return.
“I am acting on my own, for the sake of my beloved party,” he said.
Hayles, a vice president of the opposition party, replaces Dr Wykeham McNeill, who was surprisingly beaten by political neophyte Moreland Wilson in the September 2020 general election.
The three councillors, Ian Myles of the Little London Division, Lawton McKenzie of the Grange Hill Division and the Sheffield Division’s Garfield James, who was defeated by Hayles in a delegates’ runoff, are not willing to submit to Hayles’ leadership and have announced their resignation from the party.
The WMC comprises 14 divisions, with five represented by the PNP, four by the JLP, three by the now Independent councillors, and two unrepresented.
The PNP leadership, in a statement signed by general secretary Dr Dayton Campbell, says the party will honour the results of the democratic exercise to select the MP candidate.
“These three councillors were unsuccessful in their campaign for Mr Garfield James to be the candidate,” the release states. The delegates of the party and citizens of the constituency have spoken, and the party is moving forward in favour of democracy and the people’s will.”
Bertel Moore, a PNP councillor for the Negril Division which is also in Western Westmoreland, has not indicated where his loyalty lies and refused to discuss the matter when contacted by The Gleaner.
“I have no comment about this,” he snapped when asked if he supports Ian Hayles as the constituency chairman.
Political commentator Lloyd B. Smith believes that with Moore in the twilight of his career, he might be focused on securing his political legacy.
“I think it is a question of ensuring that he exits the political stage in fine style, without any swirling controversy around him,” Smith, a popular businessman, said. “From all indications, he is on his way out and I suspect that he would want to leave with a high rather than a low.”
“Clearly, the Ian Hayles factor has become a divisive element and I suspect that Moore wants to stand above the fray rather than taking any sides at this stage.”
Two years ago, the newly built municipal headquarters was controversially named after the sitting mayor, with many convinced that it was his desperate attempt to secure his legacy before his exit from the political arena.
Smith further argues that history might not be favourable to a PNP plagued by such controversies.
“It’s a catch-22 situation because it would have been difficult for the party to embarrass one of the vice presidents, so I suspect that they would have to be on his side,” The veteran journalist said. “... But these three councillors must have a certain following in the constituency and usually anywhere that the PNP has a divided situation, it usually tends not to come out at the winning end.”