File photo
'V' for victory, we are the winning team' - Eadward Seaga, right, and wife Carla gesture to party supporters during the just-concluded election campaign.Garwin Davis, Assistant News Editor
I can't help but feel sorry for Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) leader Edward Seaga.
Having lost four general elections in a row - a record for any Jamaican Opposition leader - Mr. Seaga now finds himself at a crossroads and one where every direction presents a major dilemma.
For the Opposition Leader, Wednesday's defeat at the hands of the P.J. Patterson-led People's National Party (PNP) might easily be the most difficult in the string of losses he has been experiencing since 1989.
Not for the fact that he came oh so close to defying his critics and make a triumphant return to Jamaica House but, for Mr. Seaga, the latest defeat could spell the end of his political career - or at the least - the end of his 28-year reign as leader of the JLP.
What's sad, however, is that he may not have the time he would like to ponder his future. Already the sharks are circling and the knives are long. Anti- Seaga letters are pouring in and some analysts are not sparing words about his looming departure from the political arena.
But wait a minute... the JLP won nearly half of the popular votes on election night and fell only six seats short of gaining a parliamentary majority. As a matter of fact, if you take the garrison-can't-lose constituencies out of the picture, the JLP, under his leadership, did better than the PNP islandwide.
Mr. Patterson, in a tribute to Mr. Seaga prior to the general election may have said it correctly: "No one on this side of the House has ever been able to lightly dismiss him, his views or his political manoeuvring. We have always had to take him seriously. Anyone who dares to underestimate his skills as a consummate tactician is bound eventually to pay the ultimate price."
But let's not stop there. In polls after polls (and we could go back as far the 1997 general election), Edward Seaga remains the JLP's biggest asset.
Also, in many of those polls, he consistently scored higher than even Mr. Patterson as the person Jamaicans thought was best suited to run the country. The JLP did not lose the election because of Mr. Seaga, there is little to indicate that.
The party lost because of its inability to outlast the PNP in "the battle of the trenches"...its failure to win the very close seats...the ones that really mattered.
Dr. D.K. Duncan, political analyst and a man whose politically ideology as a former firebrand Minister under the Michael Manley regime of the 1970s contrasted greatly to that of Mr. Seaga, feels the Opposition Leader should be in no hurry to depart the political stage.
"Mr. Seaga has to stick around to ensure a smooth succession for the leadership of the JLP," he said. "I am confident he will do the right thing but he has to be around to assist with that process just as Mr. Patterson will do with the PNP."
Quitting the stage
I am one of those who believe Mr. Seaga has batted his last innings and should, within a reasonable timeframe, exit the political stage if not give up the leadership of the JLP.
What I don't agree with, however, is the manner in which his detractors, some of whom can barely conceal their glee at the prospects of seeing him banished from the political arena forever, would want to go about doing it.
Almost an entire generation of people sympathetic to each of the parties was spoon fed the anti-Seaga or anti-Patterson/PNP doctrine.
Such doctrines were sometimes spattered with hate and malice... some of which we saw played out in print and on the electronic media throughout this past election.
Millions of dollars were spent in going after both him and Mr. Patterson in the form of negative ads. On some occasions Political Ombudsman Herro Blair had to intervene following complaints from both parties. In fairness, both sides resorted to the use of negative ads to attack each other.
But since we are talking about Edward Seaga, to say that he has been demonised over the years would be putting it mildly.
As his former wife, Mitzie, notes in an interview last week, "For a man who has given so much to his country it's very sad that some people have chosen to make hating Mr. Seaga a life-long career. Here is a man who had turned his back on his middle-class background to live amongst the ordinary people... a man who had voluntary given up his American passport because he felt he could pledge allegiance to only one country. What is it that he has done which is so henious to warrant some of these attacks? Those who go about doing these things, have they ever stopped to think that this man has a family... do they realise the hurt and pain their actions have caused?"
'An enigma'
Columnist Ian Boyne, a man who has been tracking Mr. Seaga's career for over 30 years notes that "From the 1960s Eddie Seaga has been a man we either love or hate; a man we can't be neutral about; a man who refuses to stay out of our attention. My father was a high priest of the PNP so the name Seaga had not made a favourable impression on my young mind. From then I was told what a fearsome man this Seaga was. In the I970s, when I came into political consciousness and was fired up by the vision of Michael Manley, I resuscitated my disaffection for Eddie Seaga. As a member of the vaunted 'progressive forces', I dismissed him as a 'reactionary', a mere 'puppet of US imperialism."
Boyne adds that "Edward Seaga has been an enigma, a misunderstood and maligned man. I was one of those who misunderstood him in the 1970s. When I got to know him better in the 90s, I found a man who, contrary to popular mythology, was warm without being effusive, humorous, and able to take criticism. I found that if he respected you intellectually you could get away with almost any criticism of him; that he would relish a lively debate. Edward Seaga has a Messianic Complex. He believes passionately in his own ideas. He is convinced he is right. He is not a classic politician. He is not driven primarily by the need for power, personal aggrandisement or personal gain. People who say this don't understand him. He is not a man hungering after popularity or a man who plays to the gallery. He operates on the basis of his own principles. He will take tough decisions that he knows might hurt him, if he is convinced it is in the interest of the country. Edward Seaga is a leader. Make no mistake about it. Eddie Seaga has enormous personal weaknesses. His tendency to abuse public officials and to threaten people whom he disapproves of is unbecoming of a person of his stature."
Maybe, as someone asserted last week, Mr. Seaga "has been is own worst enemy" and has been a victim of "his own doing." Maybe he suffers from the "foot and mouth disease" as some have been saying.
Regardless, he deserves better than what many have been dishing out to him.
