PM Laurent Lamothe and Presidential Candidate Jovenel Moise

Now that the presidential campaign phase for the Lavalas election is pretty much on the way, candidates from all walks of life are looking around for political endorsements –to increase their chances of winning the election. One of the big endorsements they are probably flirting with is that of former Prime Minister Lamothe.

The former prime minister is not in the race, so it would be pointless to support his candidacy, as I passionately did when he attempted to run for president last year. He will get my full and unconditional support whenever he decides to run again. But, in the meantime, we on the right of the political spectrum have a horse in the race, and that is Jovenel Moise, Neg Bannann nan, whom PM Lamothe agree with ideologically and politically to some extent.

If you run an opinion poll right now, you will find out that most of the people that had supported PM Lamothe for president are with Jovenel. There is a reason for that, and the reason is that they both have more things they agree on ideologically and politically than they disagree on –they are both on the right.

We [on the right] have an election to win for the country. So we are making a patriotic call to PM Lamothe for him to rally behind Jovenel in this election. In my humble opinion, I think it would be a big political miscalculation on his part to pick someone else to endorse or not endorse anyone at all. As a politician, you should always prime the country’s best interest over anything else –the country cannot survive five years of the Lavalas anarchists.

PM Lamothe does not have to join PHTK to endorse Jovenel. I am not a member of PHTK, yet I am a diehard supporter of Jovenel. Many Republicans, for instance, have supported Hillary Clinton, a Democrat, over Donald Trump, the nominee of their party. This is about the country, not party affiliation.

When you want to see certain political, economic and social changes occur, since you are a political heavyweight, any politician, whom you agree with ideologically, looking for your political endorsement must pay a price. That price, of course, will not be in monetary value or anything; it would be in that politician’s agenda. That politician must accept to make some key policy changes in the agenda upon which he or she intends to campaign and win. I was thrilled when I heard Jovenel mention during an interview that he intends to continue with the signature policies Laurent Lamothe had championed –Ti Manman Cheri, Kore Etidyan, Restoran Popile, etc –which he got beaten for left and right by the Lavalas leftists.

We just got to witness what happened between Bernie and Hillary in the Democratic Party. Bernie and Hillary had some serious policy disagreements, explaining the reason as to why we had a very heated primary. After Hillary had secured the nomination, knowing that it would be mathematically and politically impossible for her to win the general election without the Bernie supporters, representatives of both campaigns met to craft the most progressive platform in the history of the Democratic Party. Bernie got in there a lot of the things he had wanted for the young people and working class Americans who voted for him –such as debt-free college education for the young people and $15 minimum wage, which Hillary politically calls a “living wage,” for the working class. That’s how it is done.

As a new generation politician, PM Lamothe needs to show that he embodies a different kind of politics; he needs to break ties with the archaic way of doing politics in the country. Political grudges and bickerings won’t change the dire socioeconomic situation of the majority, which he has pledged to topple. My advice to him is to join hands with Jovenel, our candidate in the race, and together make the changes happen. Of course, not everything they are going to agree on. That’s politics. But if they focus on the things they agree on, they can accomplish a lot together for the betterment of the country.