Letter of the Day | Convince the PM

THE EDITOR, Madam:

Prime Minister Dr Andrew Holness has assumed the chairmanship of CARICOM. While his willingness to undertake this important role signals his belief in the value of this regional bloc, whether it will bring us any closer to the accession of all CARICOM member states to the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) remains questionable.

Even as Dr Holness speaks of moving Jamaica towards becoming a republic, something other Caribbean countries that gained independence after us have already accomplished, he has remained obdurate in his opposition to the CCJ.

This reluctance to take concrete steps to establish the CCJ as our final appellate court is problematic, as it highlights an entrenched distrust in our own people to make sound judicial decisions. The jurists on the CCJ hail from some of the most renowned universities in the world, including Oxford and Cambridge, and are arguably among the most brilliant legal minds the region has produced. And yet, for Dr Holness and his supporters, only British judges will suffice. This preference for former colonisers to decide matters of justice is the height of irony.

The Holness-led government’s insistence on retaining the London-based Privy Council as Jamaica’s final court denies ordinary citizens both the benefit of the scholarship and expertise of regional legal luminaries and access to justice itself, since only those with deep pockets can afford the journey to that court.

Although Prime Minister Mia Mottley has proposed public education campaigns to help citizens embrace the CCJ as the region’s final court, perhaps a clearer path to making this a reality would be to convince regional leaders, including Dr Holness, of the importance of finally severing ties with the London-based Privy Council, the last colonial tether that must be broken if these quasi-independent states, including Jamaica, are ever to achieve true sovereignty.

CONVINCED