A FRIEND just back from the West Indies tells me
that the chief feature of the election campaign, wherever he went, was the complete absence of any interest in the new Federation. An uneasy alliance between Mr. Norman Manley (Jamaica), Dr. Eric Williams (Trinidad) and Sir Grantley .Adams (Barbados) was fighting an even uneasier alliance of various Left-wing splinter groups; apart from a. few incidents in Jamaica and Trini- dad, . the contest between the 'Feds and the Dems' aroused little .passion. The impressiOn he brought away with him is that Federation has• come too early—before the pressure was built up which could make it work. How can it be expected to fire the electors' imagination when so many of the chief figures, including Mr. Norman Manley and Dr. Williams, refused to go forward as federal leaders because they preferred to stay put in their own islands? `Too little too late' has often been the only verdict on Britain's treatment of her dependencies; here, for once, is a case of too much too early.
PHAROS
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