PPM sweeps UDP

Kurt Tibbetts

Arden McLean	Alden McLaughlin	Anthony Eden
Charles Clifford	Osbourne Bodden	Alfonso Wright

Edna Moyle	Lucille Seymour

Alden McLaughlin and Lucille Seymour greet supporters.

The People’s Progressive Movement’s victorious
team all smiles after the final result.

Kurt Tibbetts and Alden Mclaughin

Edna Moyle delights in the support.

Thursday, May 12, 2005

The People’s Progressive Movement, (PPM) won a landslide victory in the Cayman Islands General Election 2005 on 11/12 May, when the party returned every one of its fielded candidates to the Legislative Assembly.

The party slogan of: “We need all nine - don’t leave any behind,” was heeded by the electorate who returned Kurt Tibbetts, Alden McLaughlin, Lucille Seymour and Alfonso Wright in George Town. In Bodden Town they got all three as requested with Anthony Eden, Charles Clifford and Osbourne Bodden securing the votes needed. As expected incumbents Edna Moyle and Arden McLean were returned in their respective districts of North Side and East End.

The victory sweep for the PPM failed to extend to their partners in West Bay however where the United Democratic Party, (UDP) held on to all four seats with the West Bay Alliance, (WBA) team of four unable to take one away from the UDP incumbent team.

Commenting on the defeat in light of the PPM’s success Mario Ebanks said:

“We are encouraged by the fact that there has been a change in leadership and we intend to continue working and supporting all efforts to improve the Cayman Islands.”

With all nine PPM candidates returned the disappointment of the West Bay Alliance result was overshadowed by the PPM’s enormous success in Bodden Town and the capital, George Town. The result was an emphatic rejection of the United Democratic Party in all but the West Bay district and described as a seismic shift by some voters.

“We are completely overwhelmed by the support we have received during this campaign,” said second elected member for George Town and the party’s General Secretary Alden McLaughlin. “We have raised concerns throughout this campaign about intimidation and corruption and we now intend to usher in a new culture. We will introduce a new era of consultation and participation with freedom of information and of the press. We intend to introduce a new integrity to government.

“We made these promises and the people believed us and voted us an overwhelming majority. I pledge on behalf of this organisation we won’t break these promises,” added Mr McLaughlin.

The shift to the PPM was beginning to be apparent in both George Town and Bodden Town during the course of the day as voters sought out the PPM candidates and people began to voice more confidently that they had indeed voted for the PPM as well as wishing the PPM candidates the best of luck.

The evening improved further with the early results in the outer districts of North Side and East End in the PPM’s favour.

In Bodden Town the PPM’s fortunes were evidently on the rise when the team got a clean sweep.

“We put on a campaign that was issue driven and we offered a lot of solutions; it made the difference,” said Mr Clifford. “This country is facing serious issues and we’re going to deal with them. We want people to participate in government.”

The results were announced at Pedro’s Castle around midnight to a huge crowd of PPM supporters in a sea of red shirts.

“This has been a wonderful experience for me,” said Mr Eden. “We are bringing back the faith in operations of government especially in Bodden Town which has suffered so much after Hurricane Ivan.”

Above the cheers of supporters Mr Bodden told Cayman Net News that the PPM was going to address all the issues surrounding crime. “We are going to introduce a coastguard to protect our borders from drugs and weapons and we are going to make sure the police have all the resources necessary. We will re-build the Bodden town district and make sure it gets a fair share of the pie. And we will address the problems in the Health Services as well as the inadequate education system.”

After the disappointing result for the West Bay Alliance, the results in George Town raised everyone’s spirits but they were never really in doubt. After the first few ballot boxes were opened the PPM George Town candidates were all in poll position and they never really lost their lead. The final results had the candidates in raptures of delight as they achieved their perfect goal.

“I am delighted that it was a victory by such a great margin”, said Mr Tibbetts. “Today is a great day. The public is crying for a change, and today the public have spoken.”

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