JAMAICANS may perhaps be too focused with ongoing internal political problems afflicting both the governing Peoples National Party (PNP) and the opposition Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) to reflect on the significant strides being achieved in moving their country out of the long period of depressing social and economic woes.

If an apt comparison could be made to illustrate the changes being pursued for Jamaica’s new path to economic progress and social stability, then Barbados, in the Eastern Caribbean, would easily come to mind.
For, as I have otherwise observed in the ‘Barbados Nation’, the contrasting images at this time in these two founding partner states of our 15-member Caribbean Community deserve to attract some sober attention.
Currently, while Barbadians are agonising over widening social and economic challenges (including criminality; rising unemployment; escalating food prices and the general cost of living) Jamaicans are increasingly receiving encouraging reports of a once very depressed economy now on the road to recovery, with stability in fiscal management and job creation.
Having maintained, over many successive years, the enviable reputation, under changing  administrations in Bridgetown, as perhaps the most stable and best managed economy within the Caribbean Community, Barbados is currently going through the trauma that was once the norm for some CARICOM partner states, among them Guyana and Jamaica in particular.
Now, according to data and analyses from international and regional financial institutions, Guyana, for all its lingering social woes, is rated with sustained annual economic growth, varying with no less than three per cent and up to five per cent while constantly attracting high levels of local, regional and foreign private investments.
Good for Guyana, as its government copes with escalating murders and varying acts of gun-related criminality — nothing to surprise Jamaicans — while having to confront the abuse of a one-seat parliamentary majority by an opposition coalition of two parties — A Partner for National Unity (APNU) and Alliance For Change (AFC).

Aid flows
But of more and immediate relevance is the slowly changing and quite promising strides in Jamaica’s economy, for far too long mired with recurring bizarre devaluations, skyrocketing unemployment and a spreading criminal rampage that should not be ignored by even its more ardent detractors. 

Happily for Jamaicans and the government of Prime Minister Portia Simpson-Miller (in this month when her ruling People’s National Party (PNP) is celebrating its 75th anniversary in the service of Jamaica) there came, just this past week, the good news of a  so-called “thumbs up” from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for the government’s economic and fiscal management policies.
In a brief media statement reported out of Kingston, the IMF Resident Representative, Bert van Selm has praised the PNP-led government for its policies. He pointed out that the economic reform programme being supported by the Fund “has been strong…”
That perspective by the IFM runs counter to assessments by the government’s primary opponent, the JLP, which remains committed to highlighting the negatives that help to sustain traditional divisions between national elections that could be rationalised as classic Westminster-style multi-party parliamentary politics.
Nevertheless, positive elements contributing to the changing optimistic mood among Jamaicans, while their Barbadian brethren are singing the ‘blues” would include the official commitment earlier this year the IMF’s approval of US$932.3 million for this country under its Extended Fund Facility (EFF). The World Bank and Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) have also respectively agreed to allocate US$510 million to Jamaica over the next four years.
                            
PNP’s 75th anniversary  
Not surprisingly, Prime Minister Simpson-Miller and her decision-making colleagues are taking advantage of the PNP’s 75th anniversary this month to highlight the party’s political, social , economic and cultural  gains in the service of the Jamaican people over the past seven- and-a-half decades.

A most valuable book, chronicling these 75 years of the PNP’s history, has been edited and compiled by Delano Franklyn, one of the best known authors and producers of the party in and out of government. But more of this later.
For now, and consistent with focusing on the changing images of Barbados and Jamaica, while optimism is on the upswing for Jamaicans, the more politically disenchanted and restless Barbadians are openly talking and writing that a snap general election may be difficult for the ruling Democratic Labour Party administration of Prime Minister Freundel Stuart to avoid.
This is dismissed as sheer political heresy by the ruling DLP’s faithful “believers”. For its part, the opposition Barbados Labour Party (BLP) has seized the initiative to go on the offensive against Prime Minister Stuart’s leadership, portraying him as heading a virtual “lame-duck” administration.

Snap poll?
 The big question is whether Barbadians are really in the mood for a return to the polls any time soon, having done so less than eight months ago. 

At the February 21 general election, the DLP was given its second five-year term with a mere two-seat majority in the 30-member House of Assembly, and a little over 51 per cent of the valid votes.
Currently, amid deepening social and ‘economic blues’, there is a growing perception of the government’s reluctance to hold meetings of the House of Assembly with the regularity to which Barbadians have been accustomed. Is there more in the proverbial mortar than the pestle?
This is indeed quite a challenging period for the proud Barbadian people, respected for their commitment to democratic governance; independence of the judiciary; the security forces and institutions and agencies of the Caribbean Community of which, like Jamaica, it’s a founding member.