Reproduced unedited from the online facebook site: TEAM UNC-COP:
GILLIAN LUCKY on PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION (PR) Meaningful votes
With the introduction of PR, each citizen will be assured that his vote carries a value and that a party, although not winning a particular Corporation, will have some representation on the Council.....Legal luminary, former Chief Justice and first President of the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) Justice Michael de la Bastide, who sat on both the Wooding and Hyatali commissions which examined constitutional reform, stated recently that: “The current proposal appears to be almost a pilot project in the context of local government councils and I think it is interesting because I am still in support of PR in a mixed form. It helps to soften some of the inequities produced by the first-past-the-post system.”
In the THA elections in January, the PNM won all 12 seats meaning that there was no individual to be appointed the Minority Leader. Any electoral system that is based on the “first past the post” must have inherent checks and balances and it is expected that those who occupy the opposition benches will hold the government, or in the case of the THA, the Chief Secretary and his members, to the highest standards of accountability.
That there is no other party sitting in the Assembly in Tobago constantly monitoring the actions of those in charge is an example of the deficiency of the current electoral process. Had PR been introduced earlier in our political history, we might have been more advanced in our political thinking and more mature in the manner in which we choose our representatives.
GILLIAN LUCKY on PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION (PR) Meaningful votes
With the introduction of PR, each citizen will be assured that his vote carries a value and that a party, although not winning a particular Corporation, will have some representation on the Council.....Legal luminary, former Chief Justice and first President of the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) Justice Michael de la Bastide, who sat on both the Wooding and Hyatali commissions which examined constitutional reform, stated recently that: “The current proposal appears to be almost a pilot project in the context of local government councils and I think it is interesting because I am still in support of PR in a mixed form. It helps to soften some of the inequities produced by the first-past-the-post system.”
In the THA elections in January, the PNM won all 12 seats meaning that there was no individual to be appointed the Minority Leader. Any electoral system that is based on the “first past the post” must have inherent checks and balances and it is expected that those who occupy the opposition benches will hold the government, or in the case of the THA, the Chief Secretary and his members, to the highest standards of accountability.
That there is no other party sitting in the Assembly in Tobago constantly monitoring the actions of those in charge is an example of the deficiency of the current electoral process. Had PR been introduced earlier in our political history, we might have been more advanced in our political thinking and more mature in the manner in which we choose our representatives.
No comments:
Post a Comment