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After my column on the firing of Education Minister Randolph Horton, I received several phone calls offering theories on reasons behind the dismissal. A synthesis of the most plausible left me with this:

Mr. Horton was asked, during a Cabinet meeting, to resign, not from the Ministerial post but rather from his "day job" at the Fairmont Southampton Princess Hotel. The reason given for requesting the resignation was that he needed to devote more time to the Education portfolio. In other words, he was being asked to become a full time Minister. This seems quite reasonable, particularly as the reform seems to be tangling in its own threads.

The twist, though comes from this speculation about the Premier's motives and methods. If Mr. Horton quit his day job to become a full time Minister, while his income might not suffer, his dependency on the Premier for his livelihood would take a huge leap. Dr. Brown could choose at any time to remove Mr. Horton from Cabinet thus reducing him to having only his salary as an MP. With that kind of power at his whim, the Premier would be able to keep Mr. Horton in check and reduce any inclination Randy might have to mount a challenge for the leadership.

If, the story goes, Mr. Horton had accepted the request to give up his day job and devote full time to his Ministerial post, the Premier would then be justified in asking the same of two other part-timers, Ministers Butler and Cox, who also happen to be potential contenders for the leadership. In giving up their day jobs, they too would become more beholden to Dr. Brown for their financial well-being and stability.

This is one drawback for every PLP MP (and every UBP MP, should that party win the government), of increased parliamentary salaries. The bigger the salary, the more that will be at stake from keeping or losing the job, and the more carrot and stick the party leader will wield.

He/she would have a potentially tighter grasp on the political fortunes of every candidate and could command greater loyalty.

This is the stuff of which dictators are made. They increase the power they have over those around them until everyone is reduced to puppet-on-a-string behaviour: do what the leader wishes, or else. In most countries where dictators evolve, such power comes at the muzzle of a gun.

A long list of examples

In "another world" that is Bermuda, the dominant source of power is economics, and Dr. Brown has shown his craftiness at collecting and distributing millions of dollars of the public's money in ways that secure loyalty, stifle dissent, or punish any who don't toe the line.

There's a long list of examples of the use/abuse of this kind of power. They range from the government's role in redistributing ownership of the Bermuda Cement Company; the not-yet-fully-disclosed funds doled out for ferries, airline services, golf tournaments, entertainers and so on; the various gifts, also not fully disclosed, to "charity" events such as the one Dr. Brown's son hosted at the Playboy Club; the largess of hosting a tourism "conference" in China, student dinners in the U.S., Canada and the U.K., and "official receptions" wherever a high-level local delegation touches down; no-bid contracts; selected temporary dumpster permits that become permanent; to the bloated severance payments given to people fired for 'disloyalty', essentially paying them not to talk.

This history of "unethical but not illegal" (at least not yet proven so) conduct lends credence to the suspicions.

And that's Dr. Brown's self-made dilemma: how can he possibly do what needs to be done - accelerating education reform, for example - without being perceived as self-serving? It's the bed he has made, however, and now he and his party have it to lie in.[[In-content Ad]]

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