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Cultism and Jamaica's politics
Published in the Jamaica Gleaner: Sunday | August 19, 2007
Newton Gabbidon, Contributor
I read with interest, the article entitled 'Cult politics - clergymen say party supporters will do anything to show allegiance', appeared in the Friday, August 3, issue of The Gleaner Online. The article focused ona discussion about the corrupt state of Jamaican politics by members of the Jamaican clergy, including Bishop C. B. Peter Morgan of City Life Ministries and Roman Catholic deacon Peter Espeut at a recent Gleaner Editors' Forum, which was called to discuss issues related to religion and politics.
A number of comments were made about cultism in Jamaican politics by Bishop C. B. Peter Morgan and Peter Espeut, which other members of the panel disputed. Based on the difference of opinion expressed by panellists that could leave readers confused about the nature and extent of cultism in Jamaican politics, I found it necessary to offer some facts about cultism in Jamaican politics that will help to clarify and support the position taken by panellists Morgan and Espeut that there are cultic elements at work in Jamaican politics, which are harmful to national life.
The issue of cultism in Jamaican politics is well documented in the research done by a number of reputable Jamaican scholars including George Beckford (1972), Aggrey Brown (1979), Rex Nettleford (1968), A. W. Singham (1968), Trevor Munroe (1972), and George Eaton (1975). In understanding the history of cultism and politics in Jamaica, it is important to consider the studies done by these scholars on the effects of slavery and colonialism on Jamaica's political life.
Three important effects influencing cultism in Jamaican politics are (i) economic underdevelopment, (ii) the creation of the landless poor and urban ghettos and (iii) the rise of political messiahs and dons in Jamaica politics. It is interesting to briefly note the discussion involving Singham, Brown, Nettleford and Eaton on the third effect of slavery and colonialism: The rise of political messiahs and dons in Jamaican politics, which clearly confirms the existence of cultism in Jamaican Politics and helps to explain why the phenomenon remains such an entrenched feature of Jamaica's political life.
Colonial influence
Both Singham and Brown have argued that the colonial environment, with its culture of dependence on leaders and figureheads, political and economic underdevelopment and deference to colour and class created the conditions for heroes like Bustamante and Manley. Nettleford and Munroe have noted that according to the abundance of reports in the early 1920s, 1940s and 1950s, Alexander Bustamante and Norman Manley were regarded by large segments of the population as heroes and heaven-sent saviours of the nation. In this context, it should not be difficult to understand Michael Manley in the early 1970s assuming the name 'Joshua', the leader who succeeded Moses with a divine mandate to lead the people of Israel into the Promised Land. To bolster his position as that of a heaven-sent messiah, Manley also produced a rod he received from Emperor Hail Selassie of Ethiopia, revered in the Rastafarian religion as a god.
Armed with 'the rod', perceived by the large masses of the poor Jamaican populace as a symbol of divine authority to rule, Manley rode on the wave of popular support, leading the People's National Party to victory in both the 1972 and 1976 parliamentary elections. In the eyes of the poor and disenfranchised masses, Manley had assumed the status not only of leader extraordinaire, but of a god, deeply revered by them.
Those who have followed the political career of Edward Seaga leading up to his rise to political power in the 1980 Parliamentary election will also come to a similar conclusion about Mr. Seaga. Like Manley, Seaga also assumed the image of a heaven-sent messiah with a message of deliverance.
The extent of cultism in Jamaican politics is seen not only in the deep reverence shown to political leaders like Bustamante, the Manleys and Seaga by their loyal supporters, but in the level of political tribalism that has characterised Jamaican politics over the fight for political spoils, a feature deeply entrenched in Jamaica's political culture.
The late Professor Carl Stone in his 1980 classic, 'Democracy and Clientelism in Jamaica' explains the cause of this phenomenon in Jamaican politics as the direct result of Jamaica's clientelistic political system, based on the exchange of material rewards for political support. Stone explains that at the mass base of the Jamaican society, the more than 57 per cent of the population considered poor are locked into a client relationship with Members of Parliament, councillors, civil servants, exchanging their votes for jobs, housing, food, bureaucratic favours, or even visas to the U.S. and Canada. The poor are expected to deliver on election day, their vote being the payment for material reward previously received. The poor desperately need the scarce material provided by the political leaders in order to survive on a day-by-day basis.
The plight of the poor
To understand Stone's point here, one needs to consider the plight of the poor guy on the corner, who owes his loyalty to his political party to ensure the party's victory on election day in order to guarantee his economic survival. Under those circumstances, that poor guy will do anything, conceivably including killing fellow Jamaicans. It is this type of cultism in Jamaican politics that I believe is at the root of the type of senseless political violence that has claimed the lives of thousands of Jamaicans since the mid-1970s when political violence emerged as a new phenomenon in Jamaica's corrupt political culture.
Cultism in Jamaican politics is a terrible snare on our national life and clearly needs to be defeated, if as a nation, we are going to progress socially and economically. For members of the clergy on the panel to say that Jamaica's politics is not cultic is clearly a misunderstanding of the complex nature of Jamaican politics, an understanding which is critical to any kind of solution that the Church is able to offer our political leaders at this time in their search for national unity. Such an understanding is necessary to arrive at the kind recommendation made by Bishop C. B. Peter Morgan: The Jamaican cultic political system needs to be put away.
Newton Gabbidon is a Jamaican minister of religion now residing in the United States.
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