The way forward

 

So it seems we are going to get a “Ministerial form of Government”.  There is no point now in arguing that the poll was invalid and the result spurious because the FCDO has decided and what they say in the Colony of St Helena is final.

 

But what is a “Ministerial form of Government”?  I don’t think any of us is really clear, but from what I can gather it means that some of the people we elect as Councillors in August get to be called Ministers, get large pay rises (at a time when most of us are lucky to keep up with inflation) and get “more responsibility”.  And this is the bit that interests me.

 

Some of our current Councillors do not seem to care much for the people of St Helena.  ExCo, particularly, keeps making decisions that are not in the best interests of Saints, presumably blindly following what the Governor, representing the FCDO, tells them to do.

 

Do we want to give these people a pay rise and “more responsibility”?  I suggest not.

 

If we are going to have a new system of Government, I suggest we also need some new councillors to make it work.  In fact, quite a lot of new councillors.  People capable of understanding the complexities of the decisions they are required to take, not just blindly following what the seconded advisors tell them.  People who, in short, put the interests of Saints first.

 

I hope at the August election we will see lots of new names on the ballot paper.  People with the skills to actually do the new jobs they will be given.  People who will stand up for the interests of the island as a whole, not just their own.  And I, for one, will be delighted to vote for them.

 

I cannot see myself voting for ANY of the current ExCo, who have – in my opinion – consistently sold out the rest of us for the proverbial 30 pieces of silver.

John Turner: no votes

 

After careful consideration I have decided that I will not be voting in the sham “Consultative Poll” on 17^th March.

 

This is a subject on which everyone must follow their own judgement, but my reasons are:

 

1) obody’s vote will make any difference to the outcome.  The Civil Service has already reorganised itself around the “Ministerial Form of Government”.  If people don’t vote for that, do they expect us to believe they are going to un-reorganise?  However people vote, we are clearly going to get the Ministerial Form of Government.  If the conclusion has already been decided why should I bother turning out to vote?

2.       The Ministerial Form of Government is what the FCDO wants.  They have wanted it since 2004 (it was rejected in 2005 by a completely valid poll).  The FCDO funds St Helena and expects to get what it wants, so has charged the Governor with the task to “make it happen”, whatever Saints want.  This is why the whole process to date has been undemocratic and maybe even unconstitutional: selecting Professor Sarkin, a friend of the Governor, to “study Governance” and recommend the required solution; ignoring the inconvenient recommendations of the Sarkin Report; the governor’s personally selected “Governance Commission”; failure to answer any questions about costs during the “consultations”; and now a “poll” with no stated process for deciding if the verdict is meaningful.  The whole process has been fixed from start to finish to deliver the desired result.

3.       SHG only accepts public opinion when it suits it.  As quoted in yesterday’s Sentinel (p8), SHG accepted fewer than 100 positive views expressed in the Governance Consultations as “public opinion”, but ignored the fishing petition (1,191 signatures).  They clearly don’t actually care what the public thinks.

4.       When they declare that the Ministerial Form of Government is the “will of the people” (which they will, whatever the results of the poll), a few Saints will get richer and the ordinary Saints will either see no change, or will lose their jobs to pay for the new system, the costs of which have not been disclosed (it has been asked many times; it hasn’t answered).  I will not be party to this travesty of democracy.

If you do intend to vote I’d be interested to read your reasoning below.

 

So I turned the radio on a bit early for the 7pm World Service news (http://sainthelenaisland.info/samsr2.htm) and caught the end of "Sports Orgy" - or whatever they call the programme that takes over the BBC for the whole of Sunday afternoon.  There was a chap - a footballist I understand - explaining that his team - a leading one, it seems - had lost because "we couldn't find the goal".

 

Now I know rather less about football than could be inscribed on a postage stamp with a marker pen, but I vaguely remember a few things from school days.  Maybe things have changed, but I remember the goal was a big thing with white posts and a net at the back.  Unless you are very severely sight impaired I can't imagine how you could fail to find it?  And surely the other team would give you a clue - if you're going in the right direction they'll try to stop you and if you're not they won't, so even if you can't see this substantial white-painted structure you could at least work out roughly in which direction it is and proceed in the hope that it will eventually come into view.

 

I thought they paid footballists a lot of money and I would have expected that, to earn this bountiful income, the ability to locate the goal would be rather expected.