‘Brogad’ factor failed to shine
Published:Thursday | September 10, 2020 | 12:07 AM
THE EDITOR, Madam:
Notwithstanding a 15-seat increase for the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) in the 2020 election over the 2016 election, the party suffered an attrition of 31,000 voters. In other words, the JLP had 31,000 fewer voters supporting the party in this election as against the 2016 election. All of this came against the background of over 88,000 new voters added to the voters’ list for the 2020 election. The presumption that at least the vast majority of these over 88,000 new entrants are young people is on solid ground. And this presumption must now be fused with the thinking that ‘Brogad’ has inspired and attracted significant sections of the country’s youth population.
However, with a mere 406,764 persons voting for the JLP, that assumption has become untenable. Further validating the untenability of the propaganda that Holness has captured the hearts of Jamaican youth is the fact that nearly 50 per cent of the over 1.9 million voters on the 2020 voters’ list are considered young people.
AFFECTING FACTOR
Of course, there are those who will want to discredit the voracity of this analysis by saying that it was the fear of contracting COVID-19 that is responsible for the record-low voter turnout. But let me ask the proponents of this theory: why did the fear of contracting the virus not prevent these same absentee voters from staging parties, going to the beaches, to rivers, and to other places of entertainment? Moreover, these parties and other entertainment events exposed the young people to a higher risk of contracting the virus.
And let us not forget that this 37 per cent of voter turnout is consistent with what has been happening with voting over many decades.
Clearly then, the allurement of these activities proved more potent on the young people than Brogad’s promise of a brighter future.
For the JLP to have lost 31,000 voters, net, from the 2016 election, while the People’s National Party (PNP) lost a whopping 128,000 voters from the same period, it means that the only story this 2020 election is telling is that the PNP was the bigger loser, while the JLP was the ‘lesser loser’.
This is a clear sign that the only persons voting for both political parties are those who require no convincing, since their aversion to ideological persuasion has given rise to a culture where votes are cast not in furtherance of the development of the country and its institutions, but rather, on what and who can satisfy the voter’s individual and immediate needs.
CASHLEY BROWN