Dear Editor,
The "Dissident Seven," Loretta Butler-Turner and the other six FNM MPs who support her, are being lambasted in many quarters. But tell me: What were they to do? They very clearly have no confidence in Dr. Hubert Minnis. And why should they?
Can anyone in this country who knows anything at all about politics say with a straight face that Minnis has been a good or effective leader of the opposition?
To the contrary, Minnis has been the most ineffective opposition leader since the introduction of party politics in The Bahamas. If Minnis has political leadership ability, he hides it well. I have watched Minnis like a hawk for four years and I see no evidence of it.
We have all long known that Minnis' colleagues have no confidence in him, and we're not talking here about two or three people. We are talking seven out of 10. That is more than two thirds. This is an overwhelming majority.
Convention dictates that Minnis resign as FNM party leader. But of course, he's never going to. The only convention that Minnis seems interested in is the one that elected him leader.
Loretta and her team have taken the only legal remedy available to them.
Instead of blaming Loretta - blame the system. It is the system for electing FNM leaders that made Minnis leader of the FNM and now makes it virtually impossible to get rid of him. The process for electing the leader of the Free National Movement is not merely deeply flawed, it is absolutely asinine!
Does it make any sense that, in a country with an electorate of nearly 200,000, a major political party with tens of thousands of supporters would have a mere 400 people determine its leader? But it gets even worse. Since it requires only a simple majority, the leader can be chosen by just over 200 people. Remember now, we're talking about one of the two major political parties in the country. This leader, who is one of the two who will in all likelihood emerge as prime minister, is chosen by a mere 200 people. Not only does it not make sense. It is simply stupid.
We're talking here about a process that advantages and rewards an incumbent at the expense of everyone else. No one else benefits, not the party nor the country. The leader, from the time he assumes the leadership, simply goes about stacking the deck in his favor. He ensures his longevity by influencing the process that puts the people in place who become the delegates that choose the leader. These people owe their allegiance to him.
Minnis acknowledged as much when he boasted on the eve of the leadership convention that he would win because, and I quote, " I have established a personal relationship with the delegates."
This is certainly easy enough when there are only 400 of them. This process encourages the wrong culture. You leave the party vulnerable to those who seek to choose a leader not because he is best suited to lead, or out of concern for the party or the country, but because "das muh boy".
Let me hasten to add that Minnis did not create this leadership election process. He merely exploited it. This, of course, he had every right to do. As have all the other leaders before him. The system should never have been left open to such exploitation.
A similar situation exists in the other major party, the governing Progressive Liberal Party. The only difference being that the number of delegates choosing the PLP leader is significantly larger than in the FNM.
Perry Christie has been leader of the PLP for two decades. Most of those privileged with the responsibility of choosing the PLP leader have been afforded that privilege by Perry Christie. They owe their allegiance to Christie. You think they will vote against him? If you think so, just ask Dr. Bernard Nottage.
The system being employed here does not benefit these parties or this country. For one thing this process shuts out capable, aspiring young leaders who would have no chance of winning a leadership election against an incumbent leader. Not under these conditions.
A leader therefore goes not when he's old and tired and washed up, but when he's good and ready. With this process in place, he can hang around forever.
These leaders can crow about being democratically elected all they want. There is democracy, and then there is democracy. How democratic is it to get a handful of people you have put in place and done favors for, to vote for you?
Democracy is about openness and inclusion, participation by many not by a chosen few. The present process is so narrow, so restricted, so confined that it makes a mockery of democracy.
May I remind you that people also have the right to vote, in some cases are forced to vote in socialist countries, and those countries controlled by totalitarian regimes. But in every case the results are known before the votes are even cast. They can only vote for one party or one person. Is what we have here inside these political parties that much different? Sure. Go ahead. Throw a blow for democracy. Tout the fact that any member of these parties can nominate for the leadership. Then tell me why these two major political parties are burdened with leaders that many of their supporters would like to be rid of but are stuck with.
Why should the election of the leader of these parties be left to a privileged few? I hate like hell to sound like Donald Trump, but the system sure as hell is rigged.
It is my very strongly held view that the process used by the "Dissident Seven" to wrest the opposition away from Minnis is far more democratic than the process that has put Minnis in place as leader.
A mere 400 party insiders participated in Minnis' election. The seven members of the Official Opposition on the other hand were duly elected in open, free and fair elections, collectively by thousands of Bahamians.
I very strongly recommend that the FNM party constitution be amended to allow rank and file dues paying, card carrying members of the party to choose the leader. This certainly makes more sense than leaving it to a handful of party insiders whom the leader has put in place.
Here, let me personalize this just a little. I am a lifelong FNM supporter. I have been voting since 1977 and have never voted anything but FNM. Although I have worked the polls and campaigned on behalf of the party, I have chosen not to become an official member. What is the incentive? Really?
If on the other hand, I was able to vote for the leader of the party - that would be a tremendous incentive. I would have become a member a long time ago. So I daresay would many other FNM supporters.
Opening up the party leadership election to rank and file members would invigorate the party. Just as important, since your leader will then be chosen by thousands rather than a mere pittance, you will know that your leader has mass appeal - which is exactly what it takes to win a general election. If you open up the process to more delegates, you, of course, open it up to more prospective candidates - a very desirable outcome.
This proposed process also lessens the prospects for corruption since the numbers participating will be so much greater and many of the participants will be virtually unknown to the candidates. Prospective candidates will then have to truly campaign, rather than merely buy votes. There is also a monetary incentive here, since, of course, members pay dues. Lastly, opening up the process would provide you with a ready pool of people to work functions and the polls, instead of having to constantly scramble around for workers; since we all accept that with privilege, of course, comes responsibility.
The system employed by these political parties was not intended to serve the narrow political interests and ambition of any single individual, but to serve the parties and, by extension, the country. If the system does not serve the party and the country well - and it very clearly does not - since it is the system that has the FNM in the mess it is presently in, then the system should be overturned.
The system should reflect the realities of progressive political parties operating in a modern society and not be reminiscent of some secret society existing in medieval times.

- Cornell Stuart

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