Wednesday, June 25, 2008
Will Chris Huhne stand for Party President?
At the moment we have two declared presidential candidates, Lembit Opik and Ros Scott, both of whom have agreed to answer my 20 questions (which will be posted as soon as I have them back from both of them). But will the contest take an interesting turn if there is a third contender? I have heard that the "anyone but Lembit" lobby are looking for someone else to take him on and that Chris Huhne is the name in the frame. Hmmmm, interesting. Of course Simon Hughes lost the leadership and then overwhelming won the Presidency. But then, the last time the Presidency was contested it was Lembit who lost, so there is a feeling in some quarters that it is his turn this time. So, having had the position uncontested last time, maybe we are in for a three way battle this?
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4 comments:
' "anyone but Lembit" lobby'
Count me in for that one. Lembit is a lovely guy but the Party President needs decorum. Navnit Dholakia had it in spades, as does Simon. The main attraction of Lembit is that he a free spirit. But that very free spirit makes him unsuitable as a party President.
I'd tend to agree with that. Lembit is in a lot of ways a great asset to the Lib Dems, but having him as our President would be a very poor allocation of resources. A lot of the people who oppose Lembit's candidacy will be people who support him and rate him very highly, but who feel he's trying for the wrong job.
If Lembit gets it we lose all credibility. He's a joke. And a bad one at that. And a HUGE risk. I hear there's a lot more to come out about him. He ought to concentrate on his seat. There's no doubt that it's in danger. Why would we ant this mad man as President?
But, in defence of Lembit - he has an exceptional ability to connect with people. Having accompanied him on the "shandy run" in Henley it was an object lesson in how to engage with people. Perhaps this highlights the lack of clarity we have in the party about the role of Party President and raises the question as to whether perhaps we need two posts a party chair (who does just that and looks after our internal affairs) and a Party President who has the mayoral kind of role to be the public face of the party?
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