The 2010 election promised by Prime Minister Patrick Manning, with the assurance that it would be due "as night follows day," seems to be approaching the twilight of preparation. Engineers of the PNM election machinery are cranking up for an election that's being touted as likely to take place as early as May, this year, at least two-and-a-half years before it's constitutionally-due. Speculation within the party suggests that the Prime Minister may choose to prorogue Parliament this week. Within 35 days, the PNM political leader would be required to reach for his back pocket and advise the Elections and Boundaries Commission of the date of the general election.
With constituencies racing to meet Tuesday's deadline to deliver their nominations for candidates, the ruling party is vacillating between confidence and concern. Former Laventille East/Morvant MP, Fitzgerald Hinds, might well have been probably articulating the thinking of the more sanguine PNM election heads when he said: "I wish that we could fight on a stronger footing, but that is not the case this time." Clearly, the PNM, as a party, was no more ready for this sudden election plan than the public or Opposition.
With his job assured for the next 30 months, at the very least, it remains unclear what the Prime Minister has in mind with this reported strategic snap election, particularly with the hard-earned knowledge of the defeat the last time that he employed it. What, it needs to be asked, does the PM know that the general public doesn't, that's driving this surprising political strategy of electoral brinkmanship? Traditionally, the snap election, a premature return to the electorate for a refreshed mandate to govern, is a political strategy of opportunity or last resort. Snap elections have taken place as a way to consolidate a surge in popularity.
In July, 2002, the Labour Party of New Zealand crushed their opposition after claiming that their junior coalition partner had dissolved, but they faced the polls with strong support. In the Philippines in 1986, President Fernando Marcos called a snap election in the face of social instability and won, but widespread evidence of electoral fraud led to Marcos being ousted from power and his rival, Corazon Aquino, being declared the winner. In 2006, after a sweeping win in 2005, Thaksin Shinawatra, Thailand's Prime Minister, facing accusations of a parliamentary dictatorship and accusations of corruption, dissolved the House of Representatives and held a snap election marked by poor elector turnout that sent Thailand into a tailspin of chaos.
Thaksin would never again sit as Prime Minister, and the army took control of the country in a coup, while the "caretaker" Prime Minister was on vacation. Any suggestion that the Opposition's no-confidence motion has any bearing on the Prime Minister's strategy is, simply, a red herring. More relevant, perhaps, are current affairs that are proving unsettling, both to the body politic and, by extension, the PNM, including concerns about the investigations related to Udecott being conducted by the Anti-Corruption Bureau and the pervasive mood of dissatisfaction with these and other issues of governance among the electorate.
That temperament is unlikely to be improved by deliberations that will be shared with the public in the Uff Report. The strategy that's being discussed, the likely dissolution of Parliament on Tuesday, coupled with a feverish run to an election in just a matter of weeks, would, quite clearly, end the possibility of parliamentary discussion of the Uff Report. The move would also render moot the Opposition's no-confidence motion, while putting the seasoned PNM election machinery into gear before the Opposition parties can properly coalesce and find ways to collaborate effectively.
An election in a matter of weeks would also fundamentally change the political discussion, from annoyance with the ruling party's policies and practices, to the heated rhetoric that no one envisioned as recently as two weeks ago. Only time–and that time is just days away–will tell whether Prime Minister Manning will actually pursue this aggressive campaign to refresh his political mandate, and if he chooses to, in a matter of weeks, it will be clear if this will prove to be an act of strategic brilliance or a return to a particularly humiliating electoral Waterloo.