May 2, 2012Dear Sir,Good day Chris Famous.Your letter was well written and I did not mind reading all of it. On first blush, if I were a sentimentalist, I would be swooned to cave in to overtures about a political party being as family. Although I think your position particularly as a young man is outdated, I don’t want to be dismissive because I think you seem to be an intelligent and decent person. Those persons who challenge you have no right over what you believe or what you have decided to be your political struggle and purpose. I just want to help readers and you, if I can, to understand some of that to which you referred in statements about where Bermuda and the world is today and the idea of the PLP evolving to meet the modern day challenge.First let me say the world has been evolving away from the notion of the politics of fraternities, tribalism, nobility and special interest. The ideals of egalitarianism, the brotherhood of man, open participatory democracy and pluralism have been the modern day goals. There was a time in the history of mankind were strangers or anyone different were killed or enslaved just because they were not of the same. Enlightenment bought the human family towards pluralism where people of different faiths, ethnicity cultures and ideology can live together in a mutual arrangement honouring the inalienable right of each person.A world of plurality is not a clan or family, far from it. The politics of yesterday which saw our society separated because of race, had each race in a defensive posture and fighting for its own place in Bermuda. To some extent we cannot blame how our forefathers responded politically to their challenges, or remove the facts of our past and our lingering pain. However, we can take hold of our future and the question comes as to what ethos or philosophy should guide our future. Hugging the senses of comrades or feelings of nostalgia above the need for equality of the electorate is the wrong place for anyone to be in this time. The real truth is that both the UBP and the PLP were born out of segregation and their constructs ill suited for today. Today’s parties need to become regulated so as to become the inclusive entities for our times, which you admit is a different world.It should no longer be about that little family of 20 and 30 members of a branch, or the all powerful 1,200 paid up membership, it should be about the 1,100 in the constituency and the 39,000 members of the electorate. Yes the party is separate from the government but you must admit, party members feel an exclusivity and a special privilege over and above the non-member majority public, which by the way is practicing elitism. Be true to yourself, you have heard it said “we (gov) need to take care of our members”.The UBP is gone and needed to go and to be fair the UBP members thought of their party affiliations the same as you do for yours and the challenge for the OBA is that many of their supporters want the same old comradely relations of former times. The OBA are in a good position to become a relevant 21st Century organisation but it will take strong foresight and vigilance on the leadership to get there. It’s a revolution. The PLP can also be instrumental in the needed political revolution, if persons like you begin to understand where the party is and where people like you need to take it in order to become a relevant 21st Century party.Solidarity loyalty and all that chummy stuff won’t get you there without a clear future vision of inclusion and then a resolve to commit to the work. of opening up to get there.KHALID WASI