Bruce Golding Elected Jamaica's Eigth Prime Minister

Bruce Golding Prime Minister.

It appears Bruce Golding will be sworn in as Prime Minister of Jamaica.  Mr. Golding won the general election with only 60.4 percent of the electorate voting, meaning 39.6 percent of the voting population stayed home.  The win, was by a very small margin with the Jamaica Labor Party (JLP) taking 33% of the vote to 27% for the the People's National Party (PNP), this could all change due to possible recounts that have been called.  One would think there would have been a greater turn out for the vote since the PNP had been in power since 1992 under the leadership of former Prime Minister Perceval J. Patterson (1992-2006) and outgoing Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller (2006-2007), the first woman to be elected president of the PNP and the first female Prime Minister of Jamaica. 

Like most elections Jamaica is not to be out done.  There are allegations that two of the JLP members, Shahine Robinson (St. Ann Northeastern Constituency) and Daryl Vaz are in fact U.S. citizens and are not qualified to sit in parliament.  The second of two motions have been filed in the last 10 days with the Jamaican Supreme Court concerning this allegation, a hearing is set for September 13.

So what does this all mean?  As I pointed out before, during the Bahamian general election, that, the Caribbean is under the thumb of the all powerful United States. It's not strange that the U.S. may possibly put "agents" into the seat of power of another so called "autonomous" nation.  Is this an estention of Operation Kingfish?  However, we will wait and listen for the results of the hearing in a few days on the Robinson/Vaz hearing.  I wonder how much will change for the poor, the working poor of Jamaica with the election of Mr. Bruce Golding?   Can he undo the damage of Bill Clinton destroying the banana market for Jamaica?  Can he revitilize the Jamaican economy?  Can Mr. Golding prepare the Jamaican economy for the coming demise of Fidel Castro and the opening of Cuba into the tourist business?  Time will tell.