The call for early election catches opposition by surprise

Election fever has taken over our politicians the moment PM Manning announced his call for early election. The past days were full of pre-campaigning efforts; passionate articles in the papers, exchanged polemics, and suddenly politicians care about the people! It’s even become normal to see them on the streets quite often, perhaps to show that they live with and among us!

By any standards, Manning’s call for election was a surprise, especially for the opposition. This probably made them wonder and think about this as a contradiction; why someone who craves power like Manning would call for early election? This makes us in turn wonder; does Manning really crave power the way his rivals say? Or is he confident that he can win the trust of the people once again?

I think Manning was smart about the timing, which I think has caught the under-prepared opposition by surprise. His government, despite the shortcomings, had made significant achievements compared to its predecessors—from the construction and architecture revolution we see everywhere we turn to the energetic foreign policy that granted this tiny country an important position in the Caribbean, but also in the world stage. More important is the ambitious vision the government has presented for the country’s future in the next years. These factors put him an advantageous position.

At the same time, the smart timing has put the opposition in the corner. The opposition apparently had not thought out a clear program for the nation. Instead they busied the society with lots of nonconstructive criticism and rhetoric without action. The main approach has been to focus on using the PNM government achievements against it, especially through udecott. However, the Uff report eventually embarrassed the opposition more than the PNM because after all the allegations, the report showed that this is case is about some mismanagement, not rampant corruption. Take NAPA for example, which the report confirmed that it was built to the highest standards!

What is the opposition going to do about this embarrassing situation? No vision, no strategic program, and no plan to present to the people to weigh against the current government!

And the opposition is making its mess even messier with more confused moves. For instance, instead of looking inside for solutions they went to the US seeking advertising and campaigning expertise. Instead of establishing a center for energy or development studies to understand the needs of the country and put together a comprehensive development strategy to implement should the party win the election, the opposition resorted to foreign campaigning experts. This in effect says that the opposition is not interested in developing a program that serves the people but in one that helps them get to office.