EDITORIAL - A need for reform?

Given the degree of indignation universally expressed at the notion of a politician bribing an elector – either directly or indirectly – to ensure the benefit of his or her vote, mindful of the numerous allegations, including some from the heights of political office, of the general incidence of this practice and with the existence of a statute that criminalises this conduct, one would have thought that by now there would have been at least one successful prosecution of one or other party to the transaction, if only to dissuade others from participation in this illegal activity.

There might be more explanations than one for this. First, it might be that the incidence of such activity is exaggerated. It might also be that the authorities do not possess the political will to enforce the law to its full dissuasive extent. Or it might be the case that the law as written is incapable of effective enforcement, given the inherent difficulty of procuring evidence to establish an offence of bribery. Finally, there may be a populist acceptance that the practice has become an aspect of our electoral culture.

There may exist other rationales besides. In our opinion, it is a combination of the last two explanations stated earlier; that the law is defective and precisely so because, much as we are sad to say it, the concept of the franchise as a commodity may have become part of our electoral culture.

In Barbados, the member of parliament for a constituency seems to be regarded more as an ancient lord of the manor than as a mere conduit or agent in Parliament for the collective policy positions of his or her constituency. Thus the effectiveness of a political representative is assessed on the basis of “what have you done for me lately?”, rather than on the cogency of his or her parliamentary presentations on the constituency’s behalf pertaining to policy initiatives. It may be then that the familiar condemnatory lament of not having seen a politician in the constituency since the election campaign treats less to his or her actual presence and more to their consequent failure to supply the expected economic benefits to the constituents, whether these may be in the form of assistance with securing employment, Christmas hampers, children’s or senior constituents’ parties or simply the traditional one-off treating to refreshment.

In such a climate of supply and demand, the clever and, we daresay, the politician more likely to be successful is the one who may be depended on to satisfy the basic material demands of his or her constituents.

It is at this stage that one may perceive a disconnect with the expectations of the statute. For this makes no provision as to the specific nature of the consideration to have been supplied for its contravention, even though it is the cash transaction that is most frequently condemned; nor does it particularise a time line so that while the day of the general election might be thought of as most relevant, in fact the transaction may be completed either at a time prior to or following that fateful day.

Most critically, there is no requirement that the transaction be recorded in writing for it to be persuasively evidenced. Indeed, it need not even be orally expressed, so that a mutual understanding should suffice.

We submit therefore, that a successful prosecution for vote-buying in the current climate is highly unlikely and that if we are to parallel our condemnation of it with the clearly dissuasive penalties in the Act, there must be both cultural and legislative reform.