Crisis of morality

Martin Henry, Contributor

LET US be quite realistic about the matter: If we are expecting leadership of high moral integrity, we are going to have to do without government in Jamaica for the foreseeable future.

The Constitution is far more realistic than the many voices calling for the resignation of the prime minister over his poor handling of the Manatt, Phelps & Phillips affair, another in the string of scandals plaguing administrations in Jamaica.

No criminal offence has been identified in the matter. Just "moral failure".

What the vast majority of Jamaicans do not realise is that the 1962 Jamaica Constitution actually allows a convicted felon to be a member of the House of Representatives or the Senate while serving time of under six months in Her Majesty's prison [now correctional facility].

Presumably, he or she could still retain a Cabinet post, though with some operational difficulty, or even remain as prime minister.

Section 41(3)a of the Constitution plainly states: "If any member of either House is sentenced to imprisonment (by whatever name called) for a term of or exceeding six months, he shall forthwith cease to exercise any of his functions as a member and his seat in the House shall become vacant at the expiration of a period of thirty days thereafter."

But the Constitution is even more generous. While any appeal is pending, the president or the Speaker may extend, at the request of the member, further periods of 30 days up to 330 days!

If the member is pardoned, or his conviction set aside, or his sentence is reduced to under six months, or a punishment other than imprisonment is substituted before he vacates the seat, then, "he may resume the exercise of his functions as a member".

There has not been a single government in Jamaica with anywhere near impeccable moral standing since Universal Adult Suffrage in 1944. This includes those administrations led by persons who have subsequently been anointed National Heroes.

Apart from the scandals and publicised cases of corruption, which have plagued every administration, political violence became a hallmark of the contest for power from the very infancy of the two major political parties.

The first in a series of commissions of enquiry into political violence, the Hearne Commission was set up in 1949 when the People's National Party (PNP) was only 11 years old and the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) six.

Sir Hector Hearne, the sole commissioner, delivered a damning indictment against the parties and their leaders.

Constituency boundaries have been gerrymandered by governments before the supervisory body (now the Electoral Commission) was set up and grew strong enough to stop them.

State funds have been used, even when 'legally' done, to foster political clientelism, out of which garrisons have grown, leading to the current extradition difficulties faced by this Government.

Deeply intertwined

Gangs, guns and garrisons have become deeply intertwined with politics and, therefore, with governance, in this country.

And were we by a miracle to attain a government of exceptional moral standing which could not be swayed, that government would be unbearable among the general population, committed to getting a 'bly' as we are.

Trading the two dominant political parties in government clearly is not the answer to the moral crisis of leadership.

In what regard is the PNP with Trafigura and its repository of scandals, and with five times more garrisons to its discredit, any moral improvement on the JLP?

I make these observations of Constitution, political history, and present conditions, neither to justify nor to despair, but to inject a measure of realism into the current frenzied round of hand-wringing over the 'moral crisis of leadership' the country faces.

The best democratic constitutions rest on the assumption of the proneness of fellow humans armed with political power to be corrupt, and are carefully designed to restrain the abuse of power.

These constitutions assume the vigilance and activism - and the integrity - of the governed.

Our leaders, particularly the long-serving ones, like Bruce Golding and Portia Simpson Miller, the very ones who tend to rise to the top of the system (our political system as it now stands is not about to accommodate the rapid rise of a David Cameron) bank heavily on the gullibility, the ignorance, and the forgetfulness and forgivingness of the Jamaican people.

The answer to the moral crisis in political leadership is clear. Whether it is possible is another matter. We cannot hope to pick the right leadership from the current wrong sets, or to advance by alternating them.

And there is no peaceful mechanism to get rid of them. Should a third party rise to power, it would, under the prevailing conditions, rapidly become what it has replaced.