When personal interests advance… Who protects the image of the parties in the light of the political modernization journey?
Have political parties turned into a theater for personal benefits? Is this the expected role of the parties towards political modernization, with its encompassing of programming and collective work and prioritizing the public interest over the individual?
What happened in the past two days regarding the issue of the dismissed deputy and the disqualification of the candidate who is supposed to follow him on the party list, and the legal and political debate around it requires an extended examination of its details, as the issue is not merely party organizational procedures or legal interpretations of different and divergent texts, but it expands to reveal the bitter truth that personal interests precede public interest and they govern the parties and manage the behind-the-scenes in a blatant challenge to the electoral will and the choices of the citizens.
Let's leave the discussion in the legal aspect as there are specialists and judicial entities capable of managing it, because what also happened is a political decision led by a narrow interest, threatening the principle of trust as the first measure of politics, and reflects a coup on the choices of the voters who voted according to the order of names on the list, and turns the citizen's vote into a tool in the game of internal equations without any influence in or on it, instead of being his vote expressing his free will. This painful scene witnessed by the party arena causes severe damage and a deep shake to the image of the parties because the loss is not merely a loss of a seat under the dome of parliament but a loss of a national project that holds many hopes and responsibilities.
All Jordanian parties today are experiencing a test of themselves while under the scrutiny of the people and their popular bases, and they are all seeking to establish their presence and stability to become solid institutions, and to earn the trust of the citizens and enhance the principle of institutional work and gain political, social, and cultural legitimacy to be able to bear their national responsibilities and present their programs and ideas. We know that any new experience witnesses mistakes and requires continuous review, but we also know that some mistakes can not be corrected. The parties that still insist on prioritizing personal interests to swallow the public interest and adopt behaviors of this kind and immerse themselves in individualism cause significant damage to all parties and create a general impression about the parties other than the one we want and hope for, and put the entire political modernization project in a state of risk, threat, and disaffection and erode public trust in it, especially since we are talking about a comprehensive national project aimed at strengthening the parties and enhancing the principle of party parliamentary governments. It is unreasonable in this context to reproduce a distorted image of the parties where people wonder, are these parties that have programs and express the conscience of the people and their aspirations or are they conflicts of individuals and influence and personal ambitions?
Some parties and their administrators must realize that party political work is embodied through practice not slogans, and that political modernization is not just a "cliché" echoed in seminars, conferences, and resonant speeches, but is a national project, a general culture, and an urgent necessity for building Jordan and its future as shaped by royal orientations and wills, and that the moral and national duty requires them to respect the popular choices and commit to a path of transparency, bear responsibility, tame the ego, and elevate only the public interest. And the path towards the success of the experience does not accept fatal errors that threaten its safety.
