Despite the record low voter turnout for the January 19, 2022 general election, Barbadians have spoken, and they have returned Prime Minister Mia Mottley and her 29-member team to the House of Assembly with all 30 electoral seats.
Though the main opposition, the Democratic Labour Party (DLP), had a slightly better showing in actual votes, it was another crushing defeat that has sent the Dems back to their George Street, St Michael headquarters to ponder for presumably the next five years.
The election win has provided the Mottley-led Barbados Labour Party (BLP) with the confidence the party leader said she required to make critical decisions that will affect our population.
“I need for us to unite around a common cause, unite behind a single Government, unite behind a single leader and let us unite to fight the threats to our safety, our development and our prosperity,” Mottley said in her address to the country, vowing to “whoever emerges as this leader”.
She told Barbadians she wanted them to “unite around a common cause, unite behind
a single government, unite behind a single leader”.
Most of us are still to learn what exactly precipitated a general election 18 months early in a fast-moving pandemic that has currently sickened more than 7,000 people and killed 276.
The campaigns of both political parties went virtual because of the COVID-19 pandemic and opposition camps made much of Mottley’s “whoever emerges as this leader” comment. It appears the average voter wanted to help our Prime Minister settle that issue of leadership by ensuring that there was no other challenger.
Ironically, it is the opposition DLP that has been left reeling with their tails between their legs to battle over who will emerge as the leader in that camp. The electorate told the DLP in not so many words “We are not impressed; go back to the drawing board and come again”.
After pulling the DLP back from the brink following its devastating drubbing in 2018, Verla De Peiza shepherded the opposition party to another historic defeat in 2022. Acknowledging that she could not inspire the electorate, she did the honourable thing and resigned as president of the party.
In this post-election period, a great deal of spotlight has been cast on the troubles of the DLP. We are convinced that unless the party can find a charismatic, confident, inspiring leader, its fate may be doomed, as in the interim, one of the third parties could emerge stronger and overshadow Errol Barrow’s party.
But now that Barbadians have made their decision, our attention as citizens needs to shift away from party politics to national concerns, and there are many.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) provides us with significant information on the kinds of matters Barbadians are expected to confront in the coming months and possibly years.
At the conclusion of its sixth review and 2021 Article Four Consultation, the IMF team praised the administration for the progress it was making in “implementing their comprehensive Economic Recovery and Transformation plan, despite the challenges caused by the ongoing global pandemic and two recent natural disasters”.
At the same time, the IMF team rightly cautioned about the unknowns that overshadow the economy. “Given that the outlook remains uncertain, the authorities need to maintain sound policies and their strong reform momentum to safeguard macroeconomic stability and boost potential growth,” the multilateral institution added.
As has been outlined by commentators, the IMF is not keen on finance draining state owned enterprises (SOE) and has been pushing for the elimination of many and the significant downsizing of others. The fact is that since 2018, the Mottley administration has begun a process of downsizing the 58 SEOs that existed when it came to office. Some have already been scrapped including the Productivity Council, Gymnasium Ltd and Kensington Oval Management Inc.
In this connection the IMF stated: “To create fiscal space for investment in physical and human capital, transfers to SOEs need to decline by strengthening oversight of SOEs, revenue enhancement, cost reduction, as well as mergers and divestment. The authorities’ plans to reform the pension system and introduce a fiscal rule will also support fiscal sustainability.”
This is a clear indication that it will not be business as usual, and as hinted, some tough decisions are expected to come down the pike. We can only hope that the most vulnerable in our society and that this country’s highly taxed middle-class will be provided with some shelter from the difficult decisions that are surely on the horizon.
