Can Portia be Jamaica's Lula?FileJamaica's Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller with Brazil's President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva after the opening ceremony of the second conference of African intellectuals and the diaspora in Brazil in July...
She might have said it with a stone-faced expression which eventually broke out into a laugh, but the joke is on those who didn't think it was humorous.
My word, Jamaica really is PNP country, isn't it? It also appears that, in PNP country, any expressed opinion contrary to the accepted dogma of PNP perfection attracts more vilification than Harry Potter expects from Lord Voldemort.
The recently concluded 2011 election confounded many of the polls and predictions of Bill Johnson, The Gleaner, Gordon Robinson, Mark Wignall and Karl Samuda, and the hopes of many Labourites.
She never needed to read from a piece of paper, and even if she did, it didn't go according to script. We all guessed, calculated and surveyed, but in the end we were all wrong.
On December 23, Emily Crooks of Nationwide News Network called me looking for an explanation of the Gleaner-commissioned Bill Johnson polls published that day. That poll showed that in one week the People's National Party (PNP) had gained six percentage points to erase a Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) four percentage-point lead and move into a numerical advantage over the governing party.
The December 29, 2011 victory for the People's National Party (PNP), led by Portia Simpson Miller, provides us with an opportune moment to revisit the role that women must play in the political arena if the majority of our people are to escape the side effects of decades of patriarchal hegemony and abuse.
As I write, The Old Ball and Chain is downstairs slaving over a hot stove preparing a large dish of stewed crow for me to eat. Why? Because not only did my correct-score bet on the election go up in smoke, but my massive punt on a JLP win in the outright market is, like the JLP itself, also in shambles.
No one saw it coming. Not even Don Anderson, who was dismissed as wildly optimistic with his five-seat advantage to the People's National Party (PNP). People were predicting that Anderson would have to retire from polling after his defeat at Thursday's polls.
We continue our discussion of the lessons that can be learnt from the Southern California experience regarding transportation policy options for Jamaica. That region typifies the new form of urban agglomeration, called the megalopolis, that has negated the early to mid-20th century spatial form of the city or urbanised region...
The Jamaica Debates Commission emerged as the biggest loser in the recently concluded political debates, with its last debate being the most transparently deficient in format. The most common reaction of viewers and listeners the Wednesday morning after the leadership debate was frustration and disappointment, their high expectations having been dashed.
Over the past month, the after-election prognostications of some of Jamaica's wisest observers have increasingly converged on one theme. Academics, journalists, businessmen, politicians and clergy now seem to agree that in the post-election period, the party that governs will be faced with the sobering task of selling unpopular austerity measures to a reluctant public.
The main purpose of a political party is to gain power, while its secondary role is the general direction and control of government in the furtherance of national development. With different objectives, it is natural to expect different plans to achieve the respective purpose.
The photo accompanying this article - capturing the gridlock on the Portmore toll road - graphically illustrates the social, spatial, environmental and political contradictions that have accompanied the private automobile-centred process of suburbanisation of the working class since the 1960s.
He wasn't really born on December 25, but we pretend that that we celebrate his birth each year. We have long lost Christ from Christmas, and given that we are also making believe that there is a temporary lull on electioneering, let us also pretend that the X we will mark in four days means Xmas.
Public discussion has been recently focusing on governance of the country and how best to manage administration and development. The time is, therefore, appropriate to discuss the strategies of the past on governance structures and how well they fared.
It's still too close to call, but it appears that the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) and Andrew Holness have more of the popular support than the Portia Simpson Miller-led People's National Party (PNP).
The Gleaner's editorial response, 'A policy of traffic gridlock' (November 24), to the announcement from Dr Christopher Tufton, minister of industry, investment and commerce, regarding his plans to revive the used-car business, ...
I watched the first debate between youth of the two major political parties and noted that they have both latched on to higher education funding as a campaign issue.
The world's population reached seven billion earlier this year, and according to Jim Clifton, chairman of Gallup, a global research-based consultancy company, what the world currently needs and will need in the future are jobs.
In a previous article, 'Shifting truth on bauxite' (Sunday Gleaner, November 27, 2011), mention was made of some of the positives that flowed from the bauxite-alumina industry.
Four days after Christmas, Jamaicans will go to the polls to elect 63 persons to represent their interests in the Lower House of Representatives of the nation's Parliament, a little under 10 months before the due date.
The People's National Party (PNP), in its election manifesto, has brought to the table a set of economic proposals which are at once promising, hopeful, challenging, and balanced.
A manifesto is intended to convince voters that a future administration will provide the right environment and the right level of support towards the achievement of Vision 2030.
