In Belize, politicians are generally people with split personalities. They are one person when they are trying to get into power, but another person when they are in power.
Over a period of time, the people of Belize found out about the split personality aspect of politicians, and somewhere along the line the people began to do to Belizean politicians the same thing that the politicians had been doing to them. The people began to lie to the politicians, and to deceive them.
At Kremandala, our business is not politics, because we find it difficult to change personalities. In the code by which we were raised, people wanted to see what they got and get what they saw. In the old days, Belizeans tended to be taciturn, and to choose their words carefully. These were the characteristics of a society where most people worked with their hands and with their muscles. Talkers tended not to be doers, and in the old days it was all about doing.
Belize changed from a working society to a service society some time ago. In the service society, there is a premium on courtesy, good manners, pleasant speech, professional appearance and an accommodating personality. On Partridge Street, we are old fashioned. We are trying to adjust to the new reality.
As we write, we wonder how a politician like Albert Cattouse, Sr., would have fared in the modern era. Old “Dandy Cat” was a cantankerous, no nonsense fellow, but the voters of Belize elected him to high office, because they respected his skills and his pedigree. It is said that Dandy Cat was the main man who saved George Price’s skin when the British threw him out of London in 1957. He was Mr. Price’s right hand man in the early and middle 1960’s.
A young man who grew up working on the Kremandala compound and is the son of the Amandala publisher, became a political aspirant in 1994, when he was just 21 years old. Cordel Hyde entered politics in 1994 because the People’s United Party wanted Kremandala to be allied with them. The PUP wished for the Kremandala chairman, Evan X Hyde, to become their Lake Independence candidate, but X Hyde had learned bitter lessons in the 1970’s.
Cordel Hyde defeated the incumbent Lake I chairman in a divisional convention at Independence Hall in 1994, then he defeated him again in 1996 in another Lake I divisional convention, at the Civic Center. Cordel Hyde then proceeded to win the Lake I seat for the PUP in three consecutive general elections (1998, 2003, and 2008), defeating three different UDP candidates.
Presently, there is a power struggle within the People’s United Party. Three PUP area representatives have offered themselves as leadership candidates to replace the retiring Said Musa. The race is very interesting, because there appears to be an “official” PUP candidate, while the other two are being criticized as outsiders.
The people who run the PUP should be mindful always that one of the strengths of the PUP was always its inclusiveness. The campaign by the official candidate faction to identify and promote those who are “real PUP” or “100 percent PUP,” is a campaign which exposes the mind set which led to the PUP defeat. Since 2005, the PUP ignored and derided polls which showed public opinion patterns which were later confirmed by the 2006 and 2008 election results. The question is, it being the case that we all know the PUP leaders to be outstanding politicians, what was it that made the PUP unable to accept the polls and adjust to their reality.
We admire the political career of Cordel Hyde, his growth, maturing and sacrifice. Because of the fact that Kremandala’s business is not politics, we have not been the ultimate source of Cordel Hyde’s success. The source of his success is the PUP Lake I committee, and the People’s United Party itself. In fact, Kremandala has remained so Kremandala that even some members of the PUP Lake I committee, in last month’s campaign, worried about our position.
The question of PUP leadership is a PUP matter. Granted. But that new PUP Leader will have to come to the people of Belize, those of us whom you have to ask for our support in order to win office. These are the people who sent the PUP down to ignominious defeat on February 7, 2008. The PUP is not bigger than the people. The PUP is not bigger than Belize.
The official candidate faction of the PUP say that Kremandala is interfering in their leadership campaign. So why did you invite Kremandala to “interfere” after your 1993 defeat? Still, we think we will take your advice, and stay as far away from your leadership campaign as possible. It’s not a problem. We support Cordel Hyde and Mark Espat. You have a problem with that?