Party Politics !

There is an apt saying that refers to the salaries we pay our politicians.  "  If the pay is pea-nuts, it gets us Monkeys ! "   Our politicians are very adequately renumerated but that does not preclude a lot of what we could term " Monkey business " being played out in politics.

The very nature of the decisions being made are supposed to be in confidence, but that is vital information that may be used to make money in the marketplace if it reaches the right ears in time for them to make strategic moves. A lot of people donate money to political election fundraisers in the expectation that some of that wisdom will trickle down to them.

That puts a lot of power into the hands of individual politicians, and many are not above making personal moves in the marketplace to accumulate their own fortune. The privileged knowledge of what is going to happen in the future ensures that politicians are well placed to make the right moves to enhance their bank account.

Sometimes this is so blatant that it brings censure, but often it is masked by introducing a person seeking gain to the very civil servants tasked with implementing the policies implemented by parliament. There is usually a degree of interpretation in the way these policies are put into practice and even minor nuances are important to the outcome.

All this is subjected to the dictates of " party politics ".  A long time ago the world split into political divisions between parties that pursued a " conservative " agenda and those with a " socialist " outlook.  Since then, that has fragmented to produce many smaller, lesser parties with more specific outlooks which often hold the balance of power.  The task of governing has devolved into juggling the numbers in the parliament to gain acceptance on an issue by issue basis.

That does not necessarily deliver good government and consequently we are seeing on a world wide basis the emergence of populist leaders who shun the safeguards of democracy and gain voter appeal by " strong man " measures to implement their will.  In many instances, they cement their hold on power by eliminating term limits and rigging elections to deliver in their favour.

This is the fate that has overtaken several former democracies and in most cases the new regime rules with the support of the police and the army and becomes impossible to unseat. That is now the situation in both Venezuela and the Philippines and even in the world's major democracy we are seeing President Trump threatening to refuse to leave office if he loses the coming election.

It seems reasonable to suggest we need a new level of integrity from our politicians.   The level of shenanigans by the people we elect to office is very disturbing and in many cases it is because party  politics cements endorsed candidates in their seats.  A person with a safe margin of support has little fear of being tipped out of office, irrespective of his or her conduct in parliament.

Nothing is likely to change until we start becoming more selective with our vote.  Instead of voting for the political party, we need to evaluate the integrity of the person we trust with our vote.  Put into practice, it would deliver a cleaner, more responsive parliament with less sleaze factor !