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When storming the ramparts and fighting in the streets, idealism is essential. When the fighting stops and rebuilding begins, practical, everyday management skills are required. At its inception, the PLP was a party of idealists. Having taken over government, the PLP had to become a party of pragmatists.

For more than three decades, strong leaders led the PLP. This resulted in the party placing great store in strong personal leadership. This led to the unavoidable and consequential structural weakness that the party tended to discourage delegation of power and sharing of authority. .

In the business world this happens when a company changes from being the closely-held brainchild of its entrepreneurial creator and becomes a major corporation with a Board of Directors and a wide spread of shareholders. Essentially, when the corporation changes from being run by one man to being run by a team.

In a country, it happens when the country changes from being run by a restricted minority - Apartheid South Africa, for example - to being run by a democratic majority - post-Apartheid South Africa. When that happened, we all saw that Prisoner 46664 - the idealist - had to become President Nelson Mandela - the pragmatist. We also saw that, eventually, Mandela had to be replaced - and South Africa the country had to keep running.

So with the PLP. Storming the barricades, 1963 to 1998. Running the country, 1999 to now.

The most intriguing aspect of Dr Brown's premiership is the insistence, voiced by his most vocal supporters, and surfacing in some angry e-mails, newspaper articles, and personal comments to me and about me; that Dr Brown is the 'only' man who can lead the PLP, and that I was being disloyal by criticizing his performance. This was like insisting that only Nelson Mandela could lead post-Apartheid South Africa and that all loyalty should be to Mandela the person - not South Africa the country.

There are alternatives

If a political party is mature and consists of intelligent, experienced and responsible people, then from within its own ranks, that party must be able to provide good persons who can lead, and who will be followed. The suggestions - to me - that 'only' Dr. Brown could lead, would have it that in all of the rest of the PLP, there was not one person who was equipped to lead.

If the assertion of 'only Brown' is correct, then the PLP would be endangering all Bermuda. If that assertion is not correct, then it means that the PLP is well equipped to change leaders and still lead and manage Bermuda.

The PLP has other intelligent, experienced, and responsible people. I therefore do not believe -nor do I accept - that 'only' Dr. Brown can lead. Besides, Bermuda's unique and complex society-cum-economy cannot be properly or well managed by a regime that consists of a 'cult of personality'.

With Dr Brown promising to get out of the picture - who else in the PLP is equipped to lead?

Paula Cox

A year ago, Paula Cox polled head-and-shoulders above anyone else. She was almost a shoo-in for next PLP Premier. However, and especially since June 2009, she has shown herself - in her own word - as politically 'neutered'.

She has let more than a million dollars a week of overspent funds slip and slide through her non-controlling fingers. Without so much as a whimper, she let national debt surge 73 per cent. She has fallen afoul of the new Auditor General. She has sat, seemingly immobilized, with unseeing eyes, spread fingers, and open chequebook.

She has lost a lot of credibility. She now appears weak and uncertain. Not firm and decisive. As neutered as she described herself.

Dale Butler

Dale Butler is the only PLP MP who stood on principle. Result? He grew in politcal stature. He is known for his flamboyance and energy and he has clearly shown his integrity. Crossing all barriers and boundaries, he is liked and respected by a wide range of Bermudians.

Could he, as a PLP Premier, lead the PLP and manage Bermuda? I reckon he could, if he wanted to, set his mind to it, and was given the challenge. He'd certainly be immensely popular.

Terry Lister

Terry Lister is another PLP MP who, much later but similarly, also stood on principle. That he needed to do some additional digging before he found the solid rock of plain honesty and clear principle suggests that he lacks the more open and faster thinking mind and clearer vision that Dale demonstrated.

From what I know and see of Terry, he is, though, a clear thinker who - as an experienced accountant - is given to using a fact-based process to make fact-based decisions that are not too clouded by ancient emotions.

Could he lead the PLP and manage Bermuda? I reckon he could. Probably not as much fun as Dale, but then Terry is an accountant, isn't he?

Wayne Perinchief

Wayne Perinchief? Now there's a 'dark horse' PLP MP. Once Assistant Commissioner of Police, and once a Cabinet minister who led that crazy Workplace Equity Act initiative. As it turned out, the Act was badly informed and ought never to have seen the light of day.

In recent months, Wayne has shown immense personal and political courage as he expressed national views that were in opposition to those of the Dr. Brown cultists, but which did reflect views held by other segments of the PLP.

Could Wayne lead and manage? Yes. Not so much fun as 'delightful' Dale, probably more interesting than 'tedious' Terry, just as able as either.

Benefit of hindsight

Alex Scott

Alex Scott, recalled? I'll bet that there are thousands of Bermudians who now see - in retrospect, and I'm among them - just how good Alex really was. How nationally expansive and how all-inclusive he was as opposed to the excluder who replaced him.

Would Alex re-run? He might not. Notwithstanding, could he lead the PLP? Sure, and - having learned the first time around, as Premier he'd probably be more forceful and less accommodating with his own ministers.

Dame Jennifer Smith

Dame Jennifer Smith? My, my. Isn't that lady's stint from 1998-2003 looking so much better nowadays? Would she come back? Probably not. Would we take her back? I believe Bermuda would welcome her back with hugs and kisses.

Lame duck

I can see other individuals in the PLP who can lead the party and who can probably manage Bermuda better than Dr Brown actually has.

A difficult year lies ahead. I do not believe that Bermuda, or any other country, is so well-protected that it can fritter away nine months of 2010 with a 'lame duck' Premier and a ruling party that is idling its brain and twiddling its political thumbs while waiting on the slow roll of its own constitutional calendar.

Few events are within our national or full local political control. With all the gunshots going off around us, Bermuda clearly has a still-growing cancer of anti-social behaviour stemming from social problems too long unacknowledged and unaddressed.

Bermuda faces an external G20 war on tax havens and an internal war against Bermuda's rise in crimes of violence. Bermuda has to contend with a changing national and global business environment. What we must do is marshal our best brains and manage to the best of our ability.

Bermuda needs to manage and be managed far better today. Tomorrow is far away and in the unforgiving and fast-moving global environment within which Bermuda now operates, a critical change promised for tomorrow may prove a change too late.

No one political group or one politician transcends this country. Bermuda needs a fresh start today, not a long wait until far-off October. Grow up. Change. Admit and undo the now obvious mistake and move on.

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