Vernon Daley

Like Charles Dickens, the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) could have somewhat of a difficulty explaining its explanation.

Last week, JLP General Secretary, Karl Samuda, said the party was maintaining its call for a referendum to determine whether Jamaica should replace the London-based Privy Council with the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) as the country's final court of appeal.

He was reacting to a recent opinion poll that showed 40 per cent of Jamaicans supporting the CCJ, against 24 per cent who said they were not in favour of the court. The remaining 36 per cent said they did not have a view one way or the other.

I would love to know the JLP's explanation for clinging so convul-sively to its position where there might be some evidence that Jamaicans are 'warming up' to the idea of the regional tribunal.

I'm not a keen observer of opinion polls but I don't believe them to be useless. They can aid in getting a general idea about the thinking of people at any one point in time.

Principled view

The JLP has said the call for a referendum is a position born out of a principled view that the people should have a say in so fundamen-tal a matter. But even principled positions should be grounded in some reality. They don't exist to serve themselves.

A referendum, as a tool of governance, is usually reserved for situations where there is deep division in public opinion on an issue. I can't see that it would make much sense to put the country through the great expense of having that vote if there is a general sense that people would support the tribunal.

In other words, the JLP shouldn't ignore that there might be a shift in public opinion on this matter. Its deliberations should take this latest development into account.

Otherwise, it might seem that its opposition is meant to promote some other purpose rather than convey the concerns of sections of the electorate.

But whether the country goes for a referendum or not, there needs to be some urgent action on the CCJ issue.

Loan

It's costing Jamaica millions of dollars a year to service its portion of the US$100 million loan that Caribbean governments acquired to set up the regional institution. But, in a sense, this is money going down the drain because the country has not been using the appellate jurisdiction of the court.

Of the 12 Caribbean countries which have signed the CCJ agreement, only Barbados and Guyana have gone all the way to making the tribunal their final court of appeal.

Here in Jamaica, things have been at a relative standstill since the Privy Council's ruling in 2005 that the bills brought to Parliament to provide for appeals to the regional court were unconstitutional.

Talks are said to be going on between the Government and the Opposition to find a meeting point on the issue but those discussions don't seem to be heading anywhere fast.

Is this a case of fiddling while the pockets of the taxpayers burn?

This is the time of the year when people start thinking about resolu-tions. Maybe the Government and the Opposition should consider committing themselves to reaching a clear and common position on the CCJ in 2007.

Vernon Daley is a journalist. Send comments to: vernon.daley@gmail.com