Buju's daughter plots upset win in Hagley Park

The Hagley Park Division in the Kingston and St Andrew Corporation (KSAC) has never been won by the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP).

The party came within a whisker of taking the seat in 2007 when Mazielyn McIntosh fell short by 75 votes.

Otherwise, Hagley Park has been the playground of the People's National Party (PNP), but Jodian Myrie is adamant that this will not be the case for long.

Nenna Wilson won the seat for the PNP by 344 votes in 2012 and is again on the party's ticket. However, Myrie, 26, the daughter of reggae superstar Buju Banton, feels an upset is on the cards.

"It is not an easy seat if you generalise Hagley Park with the constituency of East Central St Andrew," Myrie said as she moved to dismiss suggestions that the division is a tough one.

East Central St Andrew is represented in Parliament by Dr Peter Phillips. "It is a marginal division. It needed better organisation and someone who would be there with the people," said Myrie, who has been living in Hagley Park for more than three years.

IMPASSIONED PLEA

Myrie, who made an impassioned plea for Jamaicans to go out and vote in Monday's local government election, said the final touches are being done to her election machinery to bring about victory at the polls.

Only 23.6 per cent of the electors in Hagley Park voted in 2012. There was a 21.7 per cent turnout in 2003 when the PNP won the division by 634 votes, and a 20.8 per cent turn out in 2007.

"A couple elections ago I heard everybody talking about the Obama effect. Now it is the Trump effect ... . There is a Jodian effect somewhere. This just might be the shock of all shocks. This is a seat that has never been claimed by the Labour Party, so watch me create history," the mother of one said.

Myrie is Buju's oldest child, and also the daughter of Lorna Strachan.

But the young politician does not want to live in her father's shadow.

"Yes, I am the daughter of Buju Banton and he has represented Jamaica on a platform, which many entertainers have not done, and carried the banner of Jamaica across this world and back. I am embarking on a journey to do the same but on a different platform, which is that of representational politics," Myrie said.

Myrie told THE WEEKEND STAR that she has a very close relationship with Buju and that he, her mother, husband, and siblings, are supportive of her decision to enter representational politics.

"He (Buju) said, 'Jo, gwaan go represent because at the end of the day, you are doing something positive. I chose music. You chose a different route'," Myrie said.

"I don't see myself just stopping here as a councillor. I see myself going to the ultimate, which is ... everybody would want to be the prime minister one day ... and that way to push Jamaica from point A where it is right now to point B, C, D and continue developing as the world evolves," she added.

For now, her sights are fixed on winning a seat in the KSAC.

She told THE WEEKEND STAR that she has developed a close relationship with the people in the division and that she understands what they are going through.

Myrie said the major issues facing Hagley Park residents are unemployment and poor infrastructure and that she is equipped to make life better for her people.