The PNP challenge

Ian Boyne, Gleaner Writer

I had warned you last week not to underestimate Portia Simpson Miller, and predicted that she would give a significant speech which would go beyond Golding-bashing at her party conference last Sunday. She surprised many, including some commentators, but not me.

I had written last week that if one had been studying the People's National Party (PNP) carefully, over the last year particularly, one would see that the party has been displaying a level of maturity, political management and strategic sophistication which is becoming more of a formidable challenge for Bruce Golding's Jamaica Labour Party. The PNP is reading this society meticulously, responding sensitively to the clues and soundings from civil society and the media, and taking on board those issues and concerns which are most prominent on the public agenda.

The revelation

At a time when the media were running headlines about cracks in the JLP and about people lining up on different sides over the Golding-Brady showdown (without supplying proof, incidentally), it was revealed even ahead of the weekend conference that former challenger to the top party position, Peter Phillips, would be elevated to the number two position in the PNP.

By conference, it was announced that he had been appointed as national campaign director, having all candidates report to him.

For those with continuing concerns over Portia's capacity and her ability to lead a cohesive, united PNP to electoral victory, that announcement brought deep relief and comfort. And the subtext was that while the JLP was facing an internal crisis over the handling of the Coke extradition issue, the PNP was strong, united and potent with what the Gleaner dubbed "the Portia-Peter combo". With that single announcement, the PNP laid to rest the view that Portia was too insecure to work closely with Peter Phillips and that he was destined to be sidelined.

Comrades did not have to choose between the two, but could combine Portia's charisma, personal warmth and other leadership strengths with Peter's own leadership strengths. The distance between Peter and Portia was of enormous benefit to the governing JLP.

Important purpose

The courting of Peter back into the arms of Portia also served another critically important purpose. It has served as an important magnet to pull the monied classes to the PNP and away from Bruce Golding. It is an open secret that though some prominent members of the ruling class are disenchanted with Golding, they are not enamoured by Portia Simpson Miller and not too gleeful about the prospect of her return to power.

With the assurance now that Peter is near the reins of power and that his influence is growing in the party, they can now start moving funds to the PNP. That its first-ever audited statements came out last week on the heels of its party conference, and this big announcement about Peter's elevation is well-timed.

The PNP has become masters of political gamesmanship. If you are not an expert at that you will be swallowed up in politics, and it is clear that the PNP has no such intention. So last weekend, with controversy swirling over the ruling JLP, over the Brady-Manatt issue and the welcome announcement about Peter Phillips being on the right hand of power, the PNP started its conference on a high. The massive crowds and a widely hailed speech by party president just sealed it for the PNP. It was PNP Weekend, which the evangelical-pentecostal-sounding PNP leader would see as also the beginning her "season of victory".

Portia knew that people were getting tired of all the noise over Manatt, Phelps and Phillips. She knew that, as Clovis had predicted in his Sunday cartoon, that people thought her speech would focus on "Manatt, Manatt, Manatt, and Manatt!" While she threw words about lies, deception, trust and integrity, she let sleeping dogs lie.

Portia gave a speech that largely appealed to reason and argumentation. It was not that the speech was all substance. Indeed, a lot of holes can be punched in it, but her tone and tenor was so refreshingly different from the usual kass-kass and theatrics of political meetings that many overlooked its weaknesses. Even commentators like Martin Henry and Kevin O'Brien Chang, who are not particularly fond of the PNP, commended Portia for the style and tone of her presentation. And G2K found some good words for her, too.

There was no doubt that Portia scored heavily with that speech last weekend. She did well to remind people that the frequent JLP propaganda that the 18-year governance of the PNP was an unmitigated failure is simply not true to the record. A major problem with our political debates in this country is our addiction to extremes and our contempt for balance. Balance is boring and fairness is feckless - it seems, so it is eschewed. For propagandists and commentators (sometimes, unfortunately, they are one and the same), it was important for Portia to remind them of some concrete achievements under the PNP and particularly under her tenure.

Intellectually irresponsible

But Portia was also grossly unfair in her analysis on Sunday. I guess that is acceptable on the political platform and, considering what she avoided, we should be grateful, as, indeed, the country seems to be. But our role in media is to offer critique and to rise above the context of the political theatre.

When Portia asked rhetorically whether we are better off today than we were three years ago, suggesting it is because of the JLP's incompetence and mismanagement, this flies in the face of reason. That question asked anywhere in the world would elicit the same answer generally: A resounding No! And that is because, Portia, there has been a global economic crisis which has significantly cut global gross domestic product, thrown multiple millions on the unemployment heap and savaged living standards everywhere.

Those countries which had a sound economic foundation were better able to weather the crisis, but where economic growth had been anaemic for years, like Jamaica, there was no wiggle room. Talking about poverty and unemployment increasing in Jamaica and then assigning that to the JLP is less than honest. It works on the political platform, but in serious discussion it cannot be entertained. It is intellectually irresponsible.

To talk about the debt increasing by 50 per cent under Golding is another piece of disingenuous commentary. The debt has increased all over the world. I was looking at some figures as to how the debt-to-GDP ratios have swelled in developed countries since the global crisis and it was astonishing. China and the Far East have fared better but they have been affected by the global economic crisis, too. The last three years have been painful all over the world - not just in Jamaica where Bruce Golding took over from Portia and Omar Davies.

Our inability to pay public-sector workers, to engage in counter-cyclical policies, and to offer a raft of incentives to business, is related both to the severity of the global crisis and our years of economic underperformance, including those 18 years of PNP government. The PNP is now being as irresponsible in its criticism of JLP economic performance-criticism without context - just as I have charged the JLP in being irresponsible about PNP economic performance. These politicians never learn - or is it that they simply take the masses for granted?

Take the issue which received most attention in the media, the promised tax breaks to the business sector. This, along with the Peter Phillips announcement, is a part of the progressive party's wooing strategy for the business class, but is it a workable policy?

Interestingly, the Inter-American Development (IDB) just a few months ago came out with an exhaustive study on Jamaica's tax incentives to the productive sector. It is already a very impressive and extensive list. This incentive regime has failed dismally over the years to translate into economic growth.

In the paper titled Productive Development Policies in Jamaica, the IDB said, "The complex system of tax incentives distorts the actual structure of taxation. The implied allocation of capital is highly inefficient beyond the distortions generated by such a policy, the dedicated tax expenditures and the extensive informality induced in non-favoured sectors has contributed to rent-seeking behaviour and corruption."

Besides, the multilaterals are not favourably disposed toward special incentives. That kind of industrial policy measures are for a different era. Now I believe that targeted, well-managed special incentives can be very effective, as have been proven in the case of the Far East and, indeed, as worked in previous periods of industrialisation in Europe and America. Ha-Joon Chang has proven this conclusively in his books, Kicking Away the Ladder and Bad Samaritans, and Harvard's Dani Rodrik has devoted much of his recent academic career to proving that.

Special incentives

But neoliberal economic thinking spurns special incentives, favouring a level-playing field approach to macroeconomic policy. The thinking is, if you remove all the distortions in an economy, you don't need special incentives. The PNP's idea might be noble but it is not likely to be implementable in this era and with our fiscal constraints. So the PNP's promise needs a lot of hard questioning and working through.

A lot of the PNP's proposals for entrepreneurial and economic growth amount to just fine rhetoric. It's the same kinds of things which have been touted by politicians of both parties since the 1980s.

"Jamaica has never experienced such mismanagement, such incompetence, such lack of capacity, such bungling and such confusion in government," Portia told Comrades. But if we keep on inflating people's expectations - and then inevitably failing them - one day the people might just take things into their own hands. And it won't be to anyone's liking.

But, for now, the PNP is on a roll. And even if Portia's presentation has huge gaps, at least the PNP has reintroduced ideas to the political agenda.

Ian Boyne is a veteran journalist who may be reached at ianboyne1@yahoo.com or columns@gleanerjm.com.