Word: seaga
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Supporters rang brass bells in celebration. Swooning youths snaked through dances of joy. Party workers tearfully embraced one another. With a sobriety that contrasted with the noisy jubilation all around him, Edward P.O. Seaga, leader of the Jamaica Labor Party, emerged into the spotlight at his Kingston campaign headquarters and claimed "the most dramatic electoral victory in the history of the country." Unlike much of the preceding campaign's rhetoric, this was no exaggeration...
...country's Parliament, a gain of 38 over the 1976 election. The People's Party was reduced from 47 to a mere 9. With that, the island nation had taken a sharp turn in its political course: away from Manley's pro-Cuban "democratic socialism" toward Seaga's pro-U.S. conservatism...
...Since Seaga is a former official of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, the outcome also seemed to be a vote of confidence in his ability to attract foreign investment. In his victory statement, in fact, Seaga said his first order of business would be to restore economic growth. And while he insisted that there would be no break in relations with Havana, he left little doubt that he planned to alter Jamaica's foreign policy. He asked the Cuban Ambassador, who had been accused of meddling in Jamaican affairs, to leave the island forthwith...
...Seaga's landslide victory climaxed the most divisive and bloody campaign experienced by the island since it became independent from Britain in 1962. Fierce party loyalties divided the black ghettos of Kingston block by block, and many on both sides took to carrying guns. One of the casualties was Roy McGann, 43, a junior Cabinet minister and People's Party candidate for reelection, who happened to drive near a Labor Party rally; a fracas broke out, and McGann was shot and killed. Officials estimated that more than 500 people have been killed this year in fratricidal bloodletting...
Food shortages, in fact, provided Seaga with a key theme. "We are in a country that produces sugar, and you can't get a bowl of sugar." The election soon boiled down to a choice between proffered economic solutions: Manley's Third World socialism vs. Seaga's Western-backed free-enterprise monetarism. A cascade of reckless rhetoric from both parties also tried to turn the election into a false battleground between "godless Communism" and "sinister fascism...