In response to recent widespread discussion, about the nature of the prime ministership, the need for a mandate and succession planning, I present some initial comments.
The death of a Prime Minister is a matter of major constitutional moment. Unlike the Governor General or even the Queen, both of whom reign, a Prime Minister rules and that distinction makes a considerable difference, for prime ministers are truly elected monarchs.
To adopt the language of the Bible, they say to a man go and he goeth; and to another come and he cometh or as the late Excellent Errol Barrow once warned a DLP member in the House of Assembly, “the Lord giveth and the Lord taketh. Blessed be the name of the Lord”.
Such enormous powers were in ancient times wielded by kings. Then, it was rule by men. Now, we live under the rule of law, and most of the original powers of the all powerful kings, modified by important legal and political restraints, are now in the hands of a Prime Minister.
Succession to the office of the Prime Minister is therefore now governed by the Constitution and not by any preordained rules of yesteryear such as the divine right of kings.
So that Hartley Henry may have happened upon an inconvenient truth when he says that the kingmaker dies with the king, for although the Constitution does not recognise “kingmakers”,
Section 66 (3) tells us that “the office of a minister, other than a Prime Minister, shall become vacant upon the appointment or reappointment of any person to the office of Prime Minister”.
Hence, immediately a new prime ministerial appointment is made all bets are off, as far as cabinet ministers are concerned, for at that moment, they all, as a matter of law, cease to hold office as ministers.
Some news reports said it was customary for ministers to be re-sworn when a Prime Minister dies. Not true. Rather it is part of the supreme law of the Constitution that they ceased to be ministers when Mr Freundel Stuart was appointed.
They now owe their appointments only to Mr Stuart’s advice to His Excellency that they be appointed, and after the appropriate protocol of the state funeral has been observed, I anticipate further adjustments to the ministerial portfolios.
A new prime ministerial appointment reminds us that while Government never dies, the administration of the Government passes to new hands.
Hence we are now governed under the Stuart administration which was preceded by the Thompson administration which was itself preceded by the three successive Owen Arthur administrations.
But how is a new Prime Minister appointed? This brings Section 65 of the Constitution into play. That section gives the power to appoint a Prime Minister to His Excellency the Governor General, whose duty it is to discover the person who (in his judgment), is best able to command the confidence of a majority of the members of the House of Assembly.
Senators matter not in this exercise, for they are not surrogates of the people and represent no constituency. Neither do the so called “elders.”
Like kingmakers they are strangers to our written Constitution though they inhabit the concealed openings of the corridors of power!
The judgment of the Governor General is the critical point, but the choice of the elected members is the magic wand. It seals the deal, for when the people cannot speak by direct vote, their elected surrogates may constitutionally voice their transferred approval
from David Thompson to Stuart. The will of the people is thereby secured, and Stuart is thereby mandated!
It is therefore a heresy to argue, as some innocents have, that Prime Minister Stuart needs to call an election to secure his “own” mandate. The victory of the Democratic Labour Party in 2008 was based on a manifesto presented to the people of Barbados.
The people’s votes sealed the social contract between the people and that party, and the mandate was thereby given to the party to implement that manifesto programme.
The mandate in a Westminster type democracy is not given to one man, but to a party and thereby to a Cabinet collectively responsible for legislating the policy initiatives in the manifesto.
Unlike the kingmaker, the mandate does not die with the king and a snap election cannot be justified on the need for a mandate, even if other tactical strategies intrude.
Moreover, it is a dangerous departure from the checks and balances in our system to argue that the mandate is given to one man. We “elect” a Prime Minister and not a president!
There was also some discussion about the need for a “succession plan” within political parties. Put baldly, this means the grooming of an elected member to take over from the incumbent Prime Minister. But political parties are not business corporations, and succession planning may be contrary to the spirit and the letter of Section 65 of the Constitution for it may deprive elected members of the right to choose the Prime Minister.
