And while Finnegan leads the pack for transfers in the city, Queen’s Square incumbent Dean Barrow’s divisional machine has been busy with that as well. But Barrow has left that to his able political office, because he’s been busy on a national tour – or as the party calls it a series of spot checks. He’s been to the south, the west and just came back from the north yesterday. Apart from meeting residents, Barrow was also checking with his political operatives to see if they are ready for an election which many feel may be held as early as November.
It’s a cute time for the UDP, as the wave of anti government sentiment that was so robust in May has subsided, and the Opposition has been saddled with its own municipal governance issues. But still, today Barrow said his party is ready – or almost.
Hon. Dean Barrow, UDP Leader
“The candidates are either doing what they should be doing or are aware of what it is that they are not doing and getting ready to plug the holes, to fill the gaps. So I feel completely confident that all is well.
Well we know that we have at least three months. There is no way the elections are going to be called before November and so there is the month of August, there is the month of September and the month of October so three months is ample time for us to make a assurance doubly sure.”
Jules Vasquez,
One certainly has the sense that the UDP is not riding the crest of momentum it was perhaps in May into June when the entire Universal debacle was unfolding. Is this something that concerns you?
Hon. Dean Barrow,
“Not really. It is hard to...that sort of event is not going to come along every month. My sense in going out there is that people have their minds made up that they might even be a degree of scandal fatigue. There is a kind of quiet determination almost that you can reach out and touch pretty much and that convinces me that there is no way the PUP can recover.”
Jules Vasquez,
How much is the UDP’s inability to match the PUP dollar for dollar going to affect them in the field?
Hon. Dean Barrow,
“Recently, if you look at the municipal elections, the PUPs outspent us tremendously and it didn’t help them. Now they are going to outspend us even more in terms of the general elections because the stakes are higher. In the end because I insist people have already made up their minds, the money is not going to sway more than a few people. Certainly the money cannot change enough minds in order to make a difference to the ultimate results.”
Jules Vasquez,
You have this succession of events that indicate that the municipal level, the UDP is unable to manage competently or without in fighting. How much of this affected the public’s perception that the UDP, are they really ready for governance?
Hon. Dean Barrow,
“Everybody knows that the course of politics, like the course of true love, never only runs smooth. You are talking about a mass organization, you are talking about governance – of course there will be isolated incidents. There will be from time to time slippages made by individuals, there will be personality frictions, there will be stresses and strains and so I have absolutely no fears at all that our record in municipal government will be a detriment. I think to the contrary. That is not to say that we haven’t made it plain to people at the national level and at the municipal level that we need to try and ensure that the incidents of personal indiscipline must be kept to an absolute minimum if we can’t eliminate them all together.”
Jules Vasquez,
And not to put too fine a point on it but it appears that there is an endemic management problem in so far as managing these personalities and the competing egos and interests and it is becoming a difficulty at City Hall.
Hon. Dean Barrow,
“Well I absolutely don’t agree. I don’t see any evidence of that. Again to the extent that there are little tensions that surface from time to time, that is to be expected in any mass organizations.”
Jules Vasquez,
But Sir there were resignations of senior managers.
Hon. Dean Barrow,
“That were pulled back, weren’t they. Obviously there was a misunderstanding but in the end the proof of the pudding is in the eating. I see all the senior managers back on the job.”
Jules Vasquez,
For the public, even if it is minor, a loss of confidence in the City Council for not being Camelot then, for having friction, for having difficulties, the Dean Samuels incident – you don’t think that this has a deflating, a somewhat deflating effect in the public’s mind on the ability of the UDP to govern in a competent problem free way?
Hon. Dean Barrow,
“Momentarily it might have caused a hiccup but I insist that people are sophisticated enough to see the bigger picture. People are not at all in this country single minded. They know that no party is capable of perfection but they will be able to make not an emotional, an informed judgment on the basis of the record and in the final analysis, when the comparison is made between the UDP and the PUP at the municipal level, at the national level, individual for individual, record for record if you go back to the two terms we were in government – the people of this country will not be able to be left in any doubt that this scandal plagued, scandal ridden, corruption driven current administration cannot for the sake of the sanity and progress of our nation be returned to power.”
