Fitz Jackson makes pledge to Portmore

If the Andrew Holness administration enacts legislation making Portmore a parish without direct consultation with its residents, such a law will be short-lived and will be overturned within 100 days of a People’s National Party (PNP) administration, parliamentarian Fitz Jackson has promised.

The seven-term member of parliament for St Catherine South, one of the constituencies making up Portmore, said the decision to make Portmore a parish should rest with the residents, and they should be directly engaged for such a determination.

The two constituencies to be affected are St Catherine South (through municipal boundaries established since 2003) and St Catherine East Central.

The Government is seeking to reduce the boundary to the north of the constituencies, impacting Quarry Hill in South and Lakes Pen and Lime Tree in East Central.

“The two constituencies have areas that fall in two municipalities: the Portmore municipality and the Spanish Town municipality. With the agreement of the JLP (Jamaica Labour Party) in 2010, what was sought was a similar exercise for the new boundary of the Portmore municipality and to do it in such a way that all three constituencies fall within the one municipality so that each MP and councillors would represent the same municipality,” Jackson told The Gleaner. “All the Electoral Office of Jamaica sought to do is to clean that up since they have to settle a new boundary for the municipality, and the JLP approved of it. Once you do boundary changes, they don’t come into effect until the next elections because the will of the people has to prevail until the next elections.”

He argued that the JLP was not pleased with its political performance after the 2011 General Elections and wanted to make unilateral changes in a situation that requires the consensus of both parties.

Jackson said that under the construct since 2003, Portmore residents initiated and fought for the establishment of their own municipality to deal with local-government issues. According to him, they said they wanted to remain in St Catherine but wanted their own local authority and to elect their own mayor.

“They have always insisted that they want to directly elect their own mayor, and that’s what they got. And I have been very strenuous in my discussions that the PNP did not give Portmore the municipality. What the PNP did was listen to the people and give them what they want. Now this prime minister (Andrew Holness) and the JLP are saying, ‘This is not good enough for you’,” he charged.

‘Very short-sighted’

Arguing that the Kingston and St Andrew municipality is the direct opposite of Portmore, he said the situation works well for the people of the former.

“Why the PM don’t say Kingston should have its own municipality and St Andrew its own? But the whole reason behind it is political and is very short-sighted. The Portmore councillors also vote in two municipalities, unique in Jamaica, just like Kingston and St Andrew. But the JLP just pick it upon themselves to be complaining for them. They are doing this because Portmore votes predominantly PNP. The councillors all vote in Spanish Town, and they vote to select the mayor. The JLP’s calculation is that if they cut off Portmore from St Catherine, those PNP votes, nine now, can’t help select the mayor in Spanish Town,” said an increasingly animated Jackson, who was sitting down for an wide-ranging interview with The Gleaner.

In 2007, he said the same predominantly PNP councillors voted for Andrew Wheatley to become mayor while Portmore elected the JLP’s mayoral candidate, Keith Hinds, to lead the municipality.

“The JLP, through its MP Everald Warmington, has stated publicly why they are doing what they are doing. The leader of the opposition has written to the prime minister to ask him to say if what Warmington has said is true given that he was speaking as a Cabinet member at the time and a senior member of the party. He has not responded up until today. I have made the call in my own capacity. He has not responded, rebuffed, condemned, or disassociated himself from the comments,” he said.

Jackson added that Warmington’s comments represented a classic case of political gerrymandering.

Citing the current situation in the United States, where Republicans have redistricted several areas to give their party an advantage in areas dominated by the Democrats, he noted that several realignments had been struck down by the courts. For Jackson, the Government is conducting political manipulation of electoral boundaries with the sole purpose of giving itself an advantage in the constituency.

“Of course it is gerrymandering. But I said before, and I can speak on behalf of the Opposition, if the JLP proceeds to change the parish boundary to cause what they are seeking to do to come into effect, without adequate and substantial consultations with the people of Portmore, the next PNP administration, within 100 days will reverse that action, using its parliamentary majority. The will of the people is central to any governmental decision that impacts their lives.”

Jackson said he would be satisfied if the people are consulted by whatever means and they vote for the status being proposed.

The Electoral Commission of Jamaica (ECJ), by law, is empowered to realign constituencies hovering at the lower limit of electors and those over the upper limit. In 2010, the commission set 31,815 as the upper limit per constituency and 14,140 as the lower level. The Constitution states that every four to six years, the Standing Committee on Boundaries should review existing boundaries and make adjustments where the number of electors falls below or rises above limits stated in the Constitution.

Jackson said at least three realignments have been done since he has been MP for St Catherine South.

The country’s elections boss, Glasspole Brown, told The Gleaner that currently, the number of electors has seen significant increases. He said the current upper limit sits at 41,366, an increase of 9,551 over the 2010 limit, while the lower limit is now 21,496, or 7,356 more than in 2010. In the 2020 General Elections, a total of 38,930 persons were registered to vote in the St Catherine South.

With St Catherine South well below the upper limit, Jackson believes he has been targeted and that the proposed boundary changes are being pursued because the JLP wants to have him removed.

The ECJ, as set out in the Electoral Commission Interim Act 2006, is to advise the Standing Committee on Boundaries of Parliament, during each period of general review, about the number of constituencies in which Jamaica should be divided and the boundaries of each. The ECJ, among other matters, advises the Standing Committee on Boundaries of Parliament. The Standing Committee on Boundaries comprises the Speaker of the House, who is the chairman, and two representatives each, named by the prime minister and the leader of the Opposition.

In the meantime, Jackson said the well-publicised destruction of houses in sections of the constituency remains in the courts. He said some persons who purchased land through the proper channels were affected and are being compensated.

There were others, however, who he said were seeking to illegally occupy plots in the area.

Jackson insisted that more investigations would have prevented many of the issues that arose.

erica.virtue@gleanerjm.com