Dr. Ken Baugh, Jamaica Labour Party chairman, speaks at the party's monthly Area Council One meeting at Meadowbrook High School, St. Andrew, on Sunday. - Rudolph Brown/Chief Photographer

Chairman of the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP), Dr. Kenneth Baugh, has accused the Government of allocating funding for critical development in constituencies along partisan lines.

Dr. Baugh made the accusation while addressing the JLP's Area One Council meeting at the Meadow-brook High School in St. Andrew on Sunday.

"There is a new low in inter-party relationships: It means that the law of the land and order is not being respected," he said.

Dr. Baugh said that, just recently, the Opposition had to speak out about an incident where the caretaker in Clarendon North Central was given the authority to install lights in the constituency, something which he said Opposition Member of Parlia-ment for the constituency, Pearnel Charles, has been lobbying for.

"It is obvious to me right now (that) allocations are being made on a partisan basis. In constituencies, they are finding ways and means of spending money in there, extraordinary money, without the knowledge of the Member of Parliament," he said.

Whitehouse scandal

Dr. Baugh further charged that the US$43 million overrun on the Sandals Whitehouse hotel project was the "king of all scandals". He said contrary to former Prime Minister P.J. Patterson's claim that Whitehouse would not be a financial burden on the people of Jamaica, the taxpayers have absorbed the cost.

The JLP chairman said that the Minister of Information, Colin Campbell's, attempt to mislead the country that the Government had been vindicated by the forensic audit was an indication of the high level of complacency and arrogance of the Government.