Shalman Scott, ContributorPHILLIP PAULWELL, a supposed trump card in the Simpson Miller political armoury declared paradoxically on a radio programme recently that the Phillips/Simpson Miller race for the People's National Party (PNP) presidency was " very, very close."
Hot on the heels of Pauwell's declaration was one Mr. Christie from north west St James who gave a virtuous view of Sister P, insisting that being woman makes her ideal to be the next Prime Minister and president of the PNP.
On the same radio show, Christie was asked which of the candidates the vast majority of delegates in his constituency supports.
This time, his tone lowered, devoid of the previous ebullience, he replied "Another candidate."
The interviewer pressed him for a name and in an even still lower dejected tone, he said "Phillips."
I wonder really what huge impact on voting delegates was expected from a launch which was preceded by so many mini launches across Jamaica with essentially the same things being said in the same way over and over in the past 12 months.
FOOLING WHOM?
And who does a ductile Phillip Paulwell think he is fooling by claiming that he has just made up his mind about whom he is to support when Maxine Henry Wilson - a stout Peter Phillips supporter - was challenged by Paulwell who also piloted an aborted resolution calling for all members of the PNP to vote for its president, a move widely seen as intending to benefit the popular Portia Simpson Miller?
Peter Phillips' handlers must not rely only on the logic of their arguments and organisational abilities to secure victory over Portia Simpson Miller.
For, indeed, life is driven more often by feelings and less by logic. The emotional and psychological influence on human behaviour are proving through new research to be more powerful than rationality and intellectualism.
They need just to watch the popularity of a Yellowman or Lady Saw! George Bush versus Al Gore elections in the United States also help to make that point. So did the Alexander Bustamante /Norman Manley encounters here back then.
HOW TO DEAL WITH MATTERS?
Granted such examples, although helpful, are not without contextual and argumentative limitations.
However, political Methodist Peter Phillips has superior intellect going for him, while populist Portia Simpson Miller has emotional intelligence going for her.
So much so that she seems to have easily gotten away without up to now an insistent demand to explain HOW she plans to get tough with matters of national security.
And HOW a better economic policy will be pursued by her.
Also why the prominent women in the PNP women's movement are not supporting her, not to mention that most of those high profile persons who supported Sister P in 1992 are now, in 2005, decidedly not backing her.
CLASS PREJUDICE
The hobby horse of an argument about class prejudice cannot be applied under the circumstances.
Portia Simpson Miller's class position, since 1992 seems to have been advanced both in terms of her marriage to a giant in the corporate world and the acquisition of a first degree from a recognised university.
So why the serious withdrawal of support by persons the likes of Dean Peart, Beverley Manley, Sharon Hay Webster, D.K Duncan, Fenton Ferguson, Horace Dalley, Danny Buchanan and Peter Bunting, just to name a few?
Which raises yet another question which is fundamental: What will be left when Portia Simpson Miller's fleeting popularity on which so much and so many are relying ... wears thin?
Or, on the other hand, the profound brilliance of Peter Phillips ceases to motivate both cases due mainly to our predictable culture of endemic mistrust?
Who will muster the courage to ride the political tempest and with a steady hand steer the PNP's ship to safety when the going gets really, really rough as it most certainly will?
Indeed, an unfolding saga to watch not just down to the wire ... but beyond!
FORM VS SUBSTANCE
The Sunday Gleaner of November 6 - the day of the launch - quoted Robert McKenzie, a delegate of St Ann saying Portia Simpson Miller is "The most popular politician in the country barring none and will be using her launch to herald a new day in Jamaican politics. There will be no stopping Sister P this time."
Continuing enthusiastically with the singing of Sister P's praise, McKenzie said: "We have to play to our strength and there is nobody with a wider appeal than Mrs. Simpson Miller."
And, indeed, that conference in terms of form saw a huge attendance, lively music with a top band and famed artistes both gospel and secular, engaging, pulsating and vibrating in the charged atmosphere of gyrating supporters of Sister P. A grand show!
But having satisfied form what of the satisfaction of structure and substance?
PORTIA'S CHALLENGES
The country and a large number of delegates, I think, need answers not just hype and crowd displays. The challenge Portia Simpson Miller faces today is extremely tricky.
First, she needs to show control and calm ... and not get carried away in the midst of adulation and adoration emanating from an expected large crowd turnout.
Second, she should demonstrate more than a superficial understanding of the national and international issues which are uppermost in the minds of delegates and Jamaicans.
And she must come across and not seem to be reading a speech written for her, even if that is the case.
Mastery of the issues must be shown by her and void of cosmetic generalities.
She needs to show that she is in charge of what she has to say and avoid creating the impression that she helplessly follows her advisers' script.
Above all, she must exercise care while promoting herself not to convey the impression that the present Government in which she shares collective responsibility is a failure.
She should show originality and naturalness in the prime time she gets. Her launch and the subsequent need for specifics by the media will seal her fate.
Her handling of the media without the benefit of advisers is her Achilles heel.
