by Colin Hyde

Point blank, let me tell you there are only two men I would give a king’s power to. One of them is Jesus the Christ. He can take the wheel. The Bible teaches that He never committed a sin. It didn’t say everyone was happy with Him. We know the sticklers of the law, the ones who crush the spirit, were not too pleased, because they took a banging.

Ah, at times some innocent people were mad at him too. The farmers whose hogs were driven over the cliff, dehn neva happy. He never got permission to go into anybody’s field to harvest their corn, and whoever owned that fig tree, really had to have patience. Hmm, there are disappointing people around who have only bad things to say about alcoholic drinks. I bet those of that kind weren’t too pleased with Him for turning a vat of rain water into the finest wine for the bram.

We don’t know if Jesus was about making youthful errors between the ages of 12 and 30, because there are no records. Well, if He did we must forgive Him, because He more than made up by what He did between 30 and 33. Three years is a long time to not misstep. Based on what He did and said during those three years, if He isn’t in the wheelhouse on your boat, you might be heading north when you should be going south, east when you should be going west.

If He isn’t king, and there’s a vacancy, I’m voting for myself. Really, if there’s a vacancy and you didn’t vote for yourself, I’d be surprised. Kings have way too much power. I trust no one that much, so I’ll have to take the title myself. If you aren’t voting for you, I ahm, ehm ask you to vote for me. Trust that I’ll defer when I am out of my water.

Now, I’ve heard too many conversations, one last week on the media, in which words get hib at Godwin for his time in government, an a want it fu stop. I’m “warning” you, whenever I hear anyone challenging da man about his time in government, I wonder about their understanding of office or if they have agenda.

Godwin’s financial dealings while in government aren’t the main source of the criticism. He wasn’t naïve. He absolutely had to know that no one exits high office smelling only of roses. Generally, 50% of people agree with you, and 50% of people don’t agree with you. The side you please will say yay, and the side who is displeased will question your motives, and might even call you a dirty rotten crook. It goes with the territory if you lead.

Godwin gets trashed by the intellectuals because he championed reform to make government more transparent so we could put a lid on corruption, and the UDP was the worst. While in government, they did next to nada to introduce incorruptible systems. Okay, Godwin was a part of that government, but he was a guest, thus he was in no position to play king and introduce the reforms he believed in.

Godwin took the job to help his floundering party, which he had helped get elected. We remember his work in government, and laud him especially for his work at Immigration.

Those who attack his supporting big money people obviously hadn’t paid attention to the other Godwin. In government, that leopard didn’t change his spots. Da man’s a daam Singaporean. I never heard Godwin excoriate Luke Espat, and no Belizean has been whipped as soundly as Luke has been. In fact, when Luke was taking his worst beating on every media, Godwin had him on the Krem Sunday Review, which he hosted. When Luke said people only stone mango tree weh di bayr fruit, Godwin said, borrow the money and get the bridge; the lender can’t take it back.

Godwin has roots friends, but I never saw him as a roots brother. My, there were people who called him a traitor when he supported Harvest Caye. Anybody who expected him to hand back the rice franchise to small farmers when the Mennonite Group had all the big machines didn’t know the man. Siding with ASR over the small cane farmers for the purchase of BSI was consistent with his resumé. We have to note that the other 3 cane farmer associations see ASR as a blessing.

Godwin explained to us how our system worked. Some of us just didn’t listen. He explained that in our system, the vote of the PM isn’t greater than that of any representative in parliament. Add to that that in Cabinet it is one man, one vote too. In the “Cabinet” system, people elected by the people inform each other and vote on issues. The Cabinet system is the concept of team. So even if Godwin were the leader, in our system he wouldn’t have had the power to do all that he championed.

I think Godwin leans toward the Republican system that is being championed by certain intellectuals. In this system, a president surrounds himself with people who share his views, and they guide his/her decisions within the law. The presidential system is a giant ego trip. Sure, there are checks in that system. But the president is as close to king as you get. I think the titular Charles is plenty enough.

Whoa there, instead of squandering our energies to push out a sensible Cabinet system, we should be going to the root of our problem, our voting system.

The Electoral Reform Society on the Alternative Vote

Now we all know our First Past The Post (FPTP) voting system is a little horror. I have been a supporter of the Alternative Vote (AV) system, definitely over the FPTP, since David Cruz introduced me to it. It is surprising that third parties enter the fray without a complaint against the FPTP. Bah, that system is only meant for two, so the third-party candidates take a banging. Then they complain about the voters, how we sell our votes for $50.

The Electoral Reform Society (ERS), at the webpage electoral-reform.org.uk, says most countries use the proportional voting system, and that the AV “is not a form of proportional representation.” It says the FPTP voting system “tends to generate two large parties, as small parties without a geographical base find it hard to win seats.” The article is pretty condensed, so they “will have to” excuse me for regurgitating all of it:

“In certain conditions, such as the 2015 General Election [in the UK], it would have produced a less proportional result than Westminster’s First Past the Post system. The British public voted not to replace Westminster’s voting system with the Alternative Vote in 2011. The Alternative Vote is designed to deal with vote splitting. Under Westminster’s First Past the Post system, a candidate the majority dislike can win, if the majority split their votes across multiple candidates.

“It was this problem that lead Australia to adopt the Alternative Vote for elections to their House of Representatives. The system is also used in Australia’s states to elect at least one House of their state parliaments. It is also used to elect the President of Ireland and in many American states and cities.

“In the United States, the Alternative Vote is often called Ranked Choice Voting (RCV).

“HOW TO VOTE…The voter puts a number by each candidate, with one for their favourite, two for their second favourite, and so on. They can put numbers on as many or as few as they wish.

“HOW IT IS COUNTED…If more than half the voters have the same favourite candidate, that person becomes the MP. If nobody gets half, the numbers provide instructions for what happens next.

“The counters remove whoever came last and look at the ballot papers with that candidate as their favourite. Rather than throwing away these votes, they move each vote to the voter’s second favourite candidate. This process is repeated until one candidate has half of the votes and becomes the MP.

“EFFECTS…Voters can vote for their favourite candidate without worrying about wasting their vote. This means there is less need for tactical voting than in Westminster’s voting system. Unlike hosting a run-off vote to decide the winner, the Alternative Vote uses a single ballot and avoids the need for tactical voting to stop a disliked candidate getting into the final round. Candidates are also incentivised to run less divisive campaigns, as candidates will want to become their opponent’s voters’ second favourite candidate.

“As extremist candidates on the political fringes are likely to be the first to be excluded, the Alternative Vote tends to work against candidates who are polarising and help those who are broadly liked.”