The Editor, Sir:

A.J. Nicholson has made a detailed and comprehensive contribution to the dual citizenship debate in his piece entitled 'Obligation of parties to the Constitution', published in The Sunday Gleaner, September 23.

This informative contribution focused primarily on the terms of disqualification - in particular that outlined in Section 40 (2) (a) of the Constitution of Jamaica which states:

"(2) No person shall be qualified to be appointed as a Senator or a Member of the House of Representatives who - (a) is, by virtue of his own act, under any acknowledgment of allegiance, obedience or adherence to a foreign power or state:

Nicholson posited this view of the disqualification condition to become operative:

"In order for the disqualification to exist, there has to be some act by the person himself, or done by someone on his behalf and adopted by him, that amounts to an acknowledgement of allegiance to the other country. This takes place when a legally competent person, deliberately and voluntarily, applied for naturalisation as a citizen of another country or adopts and accepts such an application by someone else".

The learned Queen's Counsel ought not to be congratulated for the legalistic construction cum extension in order to attempt to give some operational quality to the section involved. Rather, it is to a large extent an importation of the words utiliSed in Section 41 (1) (d) which states:

"(1) The seat of a member of either House shall become vacant -

d) if he ceases to be a Commonwealth citizen or takes any oath or makes any declaration or acknowledgement of allegiance, obedience or adherence to any power or state or does, concurs in or adopts any act done with the intention that he shall become a subject or citizen of any foreign power or state."

TENURE OF OFFICE

This section deals specifically with the 'Tenure of office of Senators and members of the House of Representatives'.

In sum this is a skilful importation of a wider condition imposed on duly sworn Senators and members of the House into the rather limited condition to be applied to those seeking nomination and election to the Parliament. It may be that our founding fathers in their wisdom sought to impose greater limitations on those who have sworn allegiance to the state and people of Jamaica.

The Constitution of Jamaica is very specific in its dealing with specified conditions. The terms and conditions specified for 'disqualification' are distinctly different in wording from that for the declaration of a member's seat as 'vacant'.

I am, etc.,

Dr. PAUL ASHLEY

ashlaw@cwjamaica.com

Attorney-at-Law

1 Braemar Ave.

Kingston 10