Tufton vows unity after bitter battle

WESTERN BUREAU:

Newly elected deputy leader of the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP), Dr Christopher Tufton, has promised to unite party supporters in western Jamaica after tensions came to a boil in yesterday's victory over incumbent chairman of Area Council Four, Dr Horace Chang.

Tufton's conciliatory note was prompted, at least partly, by Bruce Golding, the JLP leader and prime minister, who warned him yesterday that the first order of business was to unite the party's Area Council Four amid threats of violence which hearkened back to contentious internal battles of the past.

"Even those delegates who did not support him (Tufton), I told him those are the first delegates you must go find," Golding told supporters at another party meeting in his West Kingston stronghold of Denham Town yesterday afternoon.

Tufton, the member of parlia-ment for South West St Elizabeth and minister of agriculture and fisheries, dutifully obliged.

"My first job is going to be to ensure that all Labourites in Area Council Four, including my colleagues Horace Chang and Don Foote, are brought on board together in order for us to combine our efforts to win Area Council Four next time around."

Major win

The agriculture minister secured 634 votes to thump Chang, the member of parliament for North West St James, who polled 427 ballots. The third contender, Foote, caretaker for Eastern Westmore-land, was reduced to a mere statistical footnote with 39 votes.

Approximately 1,100 of the 1,250 delegate votes were cast.

Tufton, who has been tapped by pundits as a possible successor to Golding, now assumes the position as a major power broker over 15 constituencies across Trelawny, St James, Hanover, Westmoreland and St Elizabeth.

"You have expressed confidence in my leadership, and I am going to commit to you today, publicly, and as I did when I was on the ground, to working with you to ensure that Area Council Four is represented," the new deputy leader stated.

"Finally, this election says something. It says that as a party we must give full respect to the sentiments of the delegates of the party. The delegates of the party are a feature of the constitution, and we mustn't run from elections, we must accommodate them and manage them."

Building hostility

Just hours ahead of the vote, there were indications that the hostility between the Tufton and Chang camps was more than caustic banter.

In a statement to the press yesterday morning, Chang urged calm among his supporters as the situation threatened to escalate into violence.

"It has been brought to my attention that mischief, intimidation and thug-like tactics are being used by persons in support of me as a way of campaigning.

"Issuing death threats, threatening to maim and destroy do not represent the sort of conduct we expect from Jamaica Labour Party supporters and delegates alike," Chang said.

By the time the clock struck 3:34 p.m., celebrations erupted among Tufton's supporters at the Green Island High School in Hanover when they got news of the preliminary ballot count. General Secretary Karl Samuda confirmed their expectations some 15 minutes later when he made the official announcement.

"This has been a good day for the Jamaica Labour Party ... . It was well executed and it was in a manner that we can all be very proud of what transpired here today," he said.

Samuda also had some parting words for the disappointed delegates.

"Do not feel discouraged. Let us respect the verdict of the people because it is the challenge of the next general election that we are about, and we want every single Labourite on board - united as we were when we came to office in 2007 - because the persons we want to defeat are the People's National Party candidates."