Is too much being demanded of the Caribbean’s heads of government?
If there is an important lesson the Caribbean should learn from the recent death of Prime David Thompson, at 48, it is that the answer is yes.
That’s the view of Tillman Thomas, Grenada’s head of government, who thinks far too many people and institutions at national and regional levels were looking to Prime Ministers to solve almost every problem and answer every question.
“I learned quite a lot from Thompson’s death and it’s about the system of governance,” he told the Sunday Sun. “In that system, there is too much emphasis, I believe, on the Prime Minister. Even though you may have a line of ministers, at the end of the day, everybody seems to be looking to the Prime Minister for everything.
“When they talk about the government of Grenada, they don’t talk about the ministers, they speak of the Tillman Thomas Administration; in Barbados, it was the David Thompson Administration, and in Antigua & Barbuda, it is the Baldwin Spencer Administration. The system, in my view, has placed too much emphasis on the Prime Minister.”
After all, Thomas contended, the Prime Minister has a cabinet of ministers and he was but the first among equals. That was why Thomas insisted people should look increasingly to the cabinet ministers who were in charge of specific portfolios.
That’s because they have the responsibility for the ministries and they too, must be held accountable, not only the Prime Minister.
That explains why Grenada has decided to begin consulting with Grenadians about the prime minister’s constitutional role, and how the responsibility should be shared.
One idea being tossed around was to give “the head of state,” presumably, the governor general as the Queen’s representative, more responsibility.
While Baldwin Spencer didn’t go that far, like Thomas, he too, had learned some lessons from Thompson’s plight. He said the demands and stresses on heads of government by the people could and do take a heavy toll.
In an interview with the Sunday Sun before Thompson died, Spencer described the Barbados’ leader’s terminal illness as a “wake-up call for all of us”.
