Burke slams PNP

Cites massive corruption in delegate selection

ERICA VIRTUE, Observer writer virtuee@jamaicaobserver.com Friday, September 05, 2008

JUST over two weeks before the People's National Party (PNP) votes in internal elections for a new leader, influential and long-serving member Paul Burke has stung the Opposition party with a damning criticism of its delegate selection process which he labelled as fraught with corruption and which, he said, the party hierarchy has chosen to ignore.

Burke, who has had a long history of advocating strict adherence to the party's constitution, principles and objectives, stunned his audience on Tuesday evening at a lecture during which he presented letters he had written to PNP leaders between July 22 and August 11 this year complaining of massive fraud in the party's group system.

The lecture, titled 'Protecting and Advancing Norman Manley's Legacy in the PNP's 70th year' was held on the 39th anniversary of the death of Manley, a founder of the party and one of Jamaica's national heroes.

"There is no doubt that there are powerful forces who have long wanted to control democracy within the People's National Party." said Burke.

He described the growth, escalation and continued expansion of corruption in the party as a failure of leadership and said many of the party's leaders behave like ostriches when they see danger.

"The facts are, however, that they have put their heads in the sand to ingest gravel for their digestion, but many a time, while ingesting sand and blind to the danger lurking, they are preyed upon and lose their very limbs that they are trying to sustain."

Titling his collection of eight letters 'Seasonal and Paper Groups and Their Bogus Delegates, the Cancer Within the PNP and the Threat to Democracy', Burke outlined the corruption in the party which has dogged it, especially between 1989 and 2006 when it formed the Government.

Arguing that the seasonal groups often have tacit support from the secretariat at the local and national levels, Burke said that the people who register hundreds of non-existent groups fabricate membership and have them registered "without even going to duly constituted constituency committee meetings, but just get the constituency secretary to sign the forms, in clear breach of Rule 37, and are never criticised" or sanctioned "but are rewarded with a power base of paper delegates and often end up wielding real power in the party".

"We have been covering up the real truth about the magnitude of paper and non-functioning groups for too long because we have long boasted that we are the most democratic party in Jamaica and the Caribbean. Nothing could be further from the truth," said Burke.

He said that during a meeting with PNP members in a rural constituency on August 9, comrades openly admitted that the groups did not exist, that Jamaica Labour Party supporters were on lists and persons were finding out for the first time that they were chairmen and secretaries of groups.

"This is not confined to any one constituency," he said.
He highlighted Kingston Central, represented by Deacon Ronald Thwaites, as a constituency that, over the years, has made every effort at maintaining functional party groups and which, from all indications, "makes no attempt to form paper groups".

"They have set a sterling example for real democracy within their own constituency," said Burke.
In contrast, he pointed to St Andrew East Central, represented by presidential challenger Dr Peter Phillips.

"With 290 registered party groups in the constituency, there would be a minimum membership of 2,900 delegates if each group has been registered with the bare minimum of 10 members," said Burke. "If 97 per cent of the members live, and/or vote in the constituency, this would mean 2,813 persons actually belong to the constituency, and would further mean that one of every 2.2 voters in the constituency would be a member of the PNP. This is a fantastic and extraordinary feat in a constituency ranked 39th in real PNP support and fourth from the bottom in terms of voter turnout of the electorate."

He said that in 2007, with the exception of two groups, all other groups in the constituency went into abeyance.
"If we are to believe what we see on paper, in terms of groups, this is clearly and indisputably and by far, the strongest and best organised constituency in Jamaica, not only today, but ever in the 70-year history of the PNP," said Burke.

He said his example was not influenced by Phillips' challenge, but merely because it was the constituency recorded with the most PNP groups in Jamaica. "If this was the constituency being represented by [PNP president] Comrade Portia Simpson Miller, I would be taking the very same position," said Burke.

In an apparent effort to prove that point, Burke referred to a 2003 report from the PNP's powerful Region 3, which he once headed, and which was published in the party's 65th annual conference report. That Region 3 report slammed Simpson Miller's St Andrew South West constituency for perpetuating the same fraud.

"I am dealing with an issue and not any personality," said Burke, who campaigned for Simpson Miller in the 2006 PNP presidential election which she won.

When the matter of the large numbers of groups was raised publicly in early August, it was not denied by neither Phillips' Arise and Renew team nor the party secretariat, which said 290 groups were registered and fully functional.

On September 20, the party will elect either Simpson Miller or Dr Phillips as president. Phillips' challenge has re-opened divisions created by the 2006 contest which, political analysts said, contributed to the PNP's general election loss to the JLP last September.