Is Ms Harper the non-political, civil-society type?

Dear Editor,

The PPP stunned the country by naming Foreign Service Officer, Ms Elisabeth Harper, as its prime ministerial candidate for the upcoming election. All the pundits speculated that one of the party members would have been the preferred candidate. The reaction from non-PPP quarters has not been complimentary, given our ethnically charged environment.

The PPP is playing up her credentials as a civil society type with an unblemished record of national service. But is she really the non-political, neutral civil society type? I hardly think so. We should remember that Ms Harper was very prominent on the PPP-organized picket line protesting the opposition budget cuts last year. If low-level workers could have claimed that they were coerced to join those pickets, I hardly think someone of the rank and stature of Ms Harper would have been coerced. She had to have gone there of her own free will.

Everyone is entitled to belong to the party of his or her choice. And Ms Harper should be accorded that right. In that regard I defend her right to be a top candidate for the PPP.

But the PPP should not behave as if it went scouting for talent and discovered Ms Harper. They have simply chosen a supporter of their own party. A lot of the negative responses to Ms Harper’s candidacy could be avoided if she comes out and tell the public that she has for some time been a PPP supporter.

 

Yours faithfully,
David Hinds