CRC Member Disagrees the PNP is to be Blamed for Stalled Republican Process

A member of the Constitutional Reform Committee, King’s Counsel Hugh Small, disagrees with the view advanced by Prime Minister Dr. Andrew Holness that the Opposition is to be blamed for stalling the progress towards establishing Jamaica as a republic.

He was speaking on Nationwide at Five Monday afternoon.

Shaloy Smikle reports.

On Sunday, Prime Minister Dr. Andrew Holness told a Jamaica Labour Party conference in East Central St. Catherine that the People’s National Party, PNP, derailed the process due to its own political selfishness.

But member of the Constitutional Reform Committee, King’s Counsel Hugh Small, says the road to Jamaica becoming a republic should not be viewed through a partisan lens.

Opposition leader, Mark Golding, had issued an ultimatum that he would withdraw the PNP caucus from the joint select committee reviewing legislation to transform Jamaica into a republic if the prime minister did not declare his position on Jamaica’s final appellate court.

The Holness government had repeatedly stated that the discussions on Jamaica’s final appellate court would take place in phase two of the constitutional reform process.

But Golding wants the Caribbean Court of Justice to replace the UK-based Privy Council as Jamaica’s final appellate court.

KC Small says the government’s insistence on the Privy Council remaining the country’s final court is one of the issues that led to the derailment of the reform process.

Meanwhile another committee member, Dr. Nadeen Spence says the push towards making Jamaica a republic is not the disaster some would make it out to be.

Dr. Nadeen Spence, a member of the Constitutional Reform Committee. She was also speaking on Nationwide at Five.