Kristen Gyles | Jamaica’s biggest problem with constitutional reform

Perhaps for decades now, Jamaicans have been debating issues relating to the country’s governance structure and its ties to the British monarchy. At face value, many Jamaicans want the country to cut its ties with Britain and become a republic. Recently, calls for this transition unsurprisingly strengthened when Barbados decided to take this course of action.

The Government has made some attempt at canvassing the views of Jamaicans. Town hall meetings have been held, although the purpose of these meetings appeared more in-keeping with an information dissemination objective. A constitutional review committee was also set up consisting of a fairly broad cross-section of representatives.

While it is my belief that the move to republic status is a step in the right direction, it is a little concerning that the government has dedicated extensive time and funds to embarking on this process without first doing a temperature check on how many Jamaicans truly support the move and support the establishment of a Jamaican head of state. However, at this point, having moved full speed ahead into this process, the government now faces a looming roadblock – the opposition.

Any amendment to Jamaica’s constitution requires an ordinary majority in both Houses of Parliament. However, amendments to entrenched provisions require a two-thirds majority in both Houses while amendments to deeply entrenched provisions require not just a two-thirds majority vote in both Houses, but a majority vote by the people of Jamaica in a referendum. The government can easily achieve a two-thirds majority vote through collusion in the lower house but cannot achieve a two-thirds majority vote in the Senate without the support of at least one member of the opposition.

STUCK FOR A WHILE

And this is where Jamaicans are likely to find themselves stuck for a while. The Minister of Legal and Constitutional Affairs tabled a bill in parliament earlier this week to have the constitution amended in various ways. One of the proposed amendments replaces the British monarchy with a Jamaican president. This bill is effectively the first milestone in the government’s bid to get the constitution amended. The question is, how much further will we get?

The bill that has been tabled is purported to see the new constitution including our national motto, national anthem and national emblems. The bill is also said to include clarifications surrounding Jamaican citizenship criteria and other general provisions. No issues there. However, the bill also seeks to amend the procedures for amending the constitution. This will likely become a divisive issue.

Furthermore, for some time now the opposition has been insisting that Jamaica replace the Privy Council, based in the UK, with the Caribbean Court of Justice as its final appellate court. Historically, the ruling Jamaica Labour Party has never supported this suggestion. Now the opposition is saying they cannot guarantee their support of the amendments until they are guaranteed that Jamaica will be transitioned away from the Privy Council since anything short of that would, as they say, constitute ‘partial decolonisation’.

If the opposition, as a collective, continues to hold this hard end and party members continue to act as though they don’t have individual brains and individual voting rights but instead all vote against the amendments, the two-thirds majority will not be achieved in the Senate and the journey to republic status will come to a halt.

So, as it turns out, a process that affects every single Jamaican and that forms the basis of the direction the country will take for years into perpetuity, has come down to the political whims of two self-serving parties. The government seems unwilling to budge on its position against the CCJ (and has also been unable to explain why) and the opposition says it can’t guarantee its support of the move towards a republic unless it happens on their terms.

BIGGEST PROBLEM

All this highlights one thing – Jamaica’s biggest problem right now is actually not the rapidly increasing cost of living, underemployment, crime, floundering education system or deterioration in culture. Jamaica’s biggest problem is the fact that the most important decisions that affect the entire country come down to two political parties that continue to demonstrate that they care more about the success of their respective parties than they care about the success of the country. If we had people leading the country who were willing to make conscientious decisions in the interest of the everyday man and woman without considering the interests of a political party, so many of the problems that bog us down would have been solved already. I promise.

Tucked at the very end of this article, is my suggestion. Among the amendments being put forward by the Minister of Legal and Constitutional Affairs is the proposal for independent senators to form a part of the Senate under the new constitution. I applaud this proposal wholeheartedly. More independent Jamaicans need to be directly included in the parliamentary processes that will usher in our new identity as a republic.

If the government truly wants to see Jamaica move forward with a full-scale amendment to its Constitution, it should just focus on getting the composition of the Senate adjusted to include (many) independent Senators, who have bipartisan support, so that Jamaicans can finally be free from the chokehold of political interests. Once this is done, it will allow for the other matters of national interest to be evaluated objectively and to go through without being stymied. So, why not just introduce a bill to allow unaffiliated Jamaicans to ‘referee’ this process so that we can actually start making headway?

Kristen Gyles is a free-thinking public affairs opinionator. Send feedback to kristengyles@gmail.com and columns@gleanerjm.com