THE people of the UK have spoken. What issues have they voted on? It is impossible to determine under Proportional Representation what people vote for. No scientific method has ever been invented to determine which issues people chose to vote on in Proportional Representation. You simply cannot do that because in any election there are multi-dimensional issues.
Here are some hypothetical examples. The government refuses to subsidise a cricket hero. The government rejects putting money to plant trees along the city parapets. The government votes to deny a banning on animal hunting. The government refuses to vote for the condemnation of genocide at the UN.

An election is held and the ruling party loses. On what issues it lost? For me, I would like to see the cricket hero gets his financial subsidy. But that would not be the reason I would be against the ruling party. I would be against a ruling party if it supports animal hunting and frowns on denouncing genocide.
But there could have been a substantial number of voters who are not animal lovers and don’t care about genocide occurring thousands of miles away from their homeland, but wanted the cricketer to get his money. So you just cannot ascertain which vexation was the determining factor when the ballot was cast.

Under the First Past the Post system or what is also known as the constituency system, you can roughly gauge the reasons people voted. In the recent UK elections, constituency results showed that the Israeli committal of genocide was a decisive factor.
It is a factor that will cause Biden to lose. What the committal of genocide against the Palestinian people has shown to the Global South is how Western leaders who have been preaching day in and day out to Third World people, since independence on how democratic they should be are not democratic themselves.

The peoples of the USA and the European Union did not and do not support what Israel has done and is doing in Gaza. The pro-Palestinian demonstrations have been relentless and colossal in the countries whose leaders continue to give unconditional support to Israel. These countries have gone so far to undermine international peace and security by refusing to accept an arrest warrant by the International Criminal Court for Netanyahu.
What the genocide has shown the world is that leaders in the West who sermonize the people of the Global South about listening to the citizenry and giving the citizens what they want do not practise what they preach. The genocide in Gaza has also shown the world how priceless the value of free and fair elections is.
The Labour Party was always projected to win, but Labour Party had within its bosom candidates that supported Israel. In the election last Thursday, voters rejected Labour politicians who supported the Holocaust in Gaza committed by the Israeli army and government. Here is the list.

George Galloway. Fiercely pro-Palestinian, he won as an independent in a by-election a few months ago (he lost this time around).
Jeremy Corbin, former Labour leader, expelled for his stance on Israel, ran against Labour as an independent and won.
Jonathan Ashworth, Labour MP, lost to a pro-Palestinian independent, candidate, Shockat Adams.
Kate Hollern (Labour) lost to an independent pro-Palestinian candidate, Adnan Hussain.
Rachel Revees, former Labour shadow chancellor, lost to Iqbal Mohammed by 7000 votes.

Kalid Mahmood lost to one of the most pro-Palestinian politicians in the election, Ayoub Khan, who ran as an independent candidate. He beat the Mahmood from Labour by 15, 000 votes.
West Streeting, from Labour, and the most popular candidate in his constituency, barely won against a pro-Palestinian candidate. He won by 500 votes to a young, 23-year-old Palestinian girl.
Liz Truss, former Conservative Prime Minister and unapologetic supporter of Israel, lost her seat.

Here are the words of a former adviser to former Labour Prime Minister, Tony Blair: “Labour need to take the votes lost over Gaza as seriously as we took the loss of red wall.” This is going to be the pattern for the November elections in the US. Millions of young people will not vote for Biden over Gaza. The volcanic demonstrations of the nine months will cause them to abstain rather than vote for Biden.

The Labour victory last Thursday has crucial importance for understanding the hypocrisy of Western countries. Even though the people took to the streets protesting genocidal acts over the past nine months, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak did not dilute the pro-Israel policy of the British Government. So we end with the question: – in Western democracies, do leaders listen to the people.
DISCLAIMER: The views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the Guyana National Newspapers Limited.