Professionals shun political muzzle - Doctors, lawyers, business people endorse free speech
Published:Sunday | March 3, 2019 | 12:00 AMErica Virtue - Senior Gleaner Writer
Professional associations representing doctors, lawyers and business people say they would not support the muzzling of members who seek political office.
Their comments come in the wake of revelation of a concept paper by the Ruel Reid-led Ministry of Education that proposed placing a gag order on teachers, administrators and school board officials from criticising government policies unless made in a union meeting or non-political gathering.
Reid’s proposed code of conduct drew outrage last week and was roundly criticised as anti-democratic and dictatorial.
Jacqueline Cummings, president of the Jamaican Bar Association, said no such plans were being contemplated and that free speech was guaranteed under the Constitution.
“Absolutely not!” she said twice.
“We have no such plans, not at all,” she said of lawyers who wish to seek representational office.
“What a person does in their personal life is of no concern to me. As long as they uphold the canons of the legal ethics of the profession, they are free to do what they want,” she told The Sunday Gleaner, citing that many lawyers, including National Hero Norman Manley, have become legislators.
Health Minister Dr Christopher Tufton said though he was not au fait with the details of the political code of conduct, he has not given it any consideration.
“Frankly, it’s not something that I have really talked about. I have never even discussed it,” he told The Sunday Gleaner.
Dr Dayton Campbell, opposition spokesman on health, said despite his many concerns about health issues, he has never felt that the minister has a heavy hand.
“When I was president of the Jamaica Medical Doctors’ Association (JMDA), I was very critical of many of the Government’s policies. I am now a member of parliament for the party whose policies I criticised,” he told The Sunday Gleaner.
Campbell has given kudos to Tufton, stating that despite their many clashes over issues in the health sector, he has never felt that the minister sought to gag him.
“It just sounds like someone who is insecure and arrogant and does not want anyone to speak negatively of them. And the real danger is that the Government wants to censor free speech,” Campbell said, taking a shot at Reid, who is seeking to unseat him in the St Ann North West constituency on a ruling Jamaica Labour Party ticket.
Current JMDA President Dr Elon Thompson said the matter has been given no thought.
“Not because the matter is in the air it means we should give it thought or even respond to it as an association,” Thompson told The Sunday Gleaner. “But I don’t think we have a response to it. There are so many things in the sector that we need to discuss.”
And it’s much the same for Private Sector Organisation of Jamaica (PSOJ) President Howard Mitchell.
“No such plans that I am aware of. And our position as PSOJ is that free speech is fundamental to a free country. Criticism which is constructive and non-defamatory is valuable for change and progress,” Mitchell said.
He said the PSOJ would hesitate to muzzle anyone, except for the exchange of technical and confidential information, and company propriety information.
“But in terms of criticism of behaviour, activities, policies, I have encountered that nowhere in my career through business or law,” Mitchell stated.
Jamaica Teachers’ Association President Garth Anderson said the teachers’ union heard about the plans when it came in the public domain just over a month ago.
“All I will say is, how did we get here?” he told The Sunday Gleaner.
Anderson said on Thursday that he was just coming from a meeting with principals, and the matter was not discussed among them.
The education minister’s proposal to set limits on political representation became public on January 31, two days after Wolmer’s Boys’ School principal Dr Walton Small was officially presented as the PNP’s candidate for St James Southern, which is currently occupied by the PNP’s Derrick Kellier.
Reid, himself a trained teacher, former president of the JTA, and former adviser to then Education Minister Andrew Holness, heavily criticised Ronald Thwaites during his tenure as education minister. His grade for the efforts of Thwaites as minister was C-.
Reid, who was principal of Jamaica College up to 2016, has said that he is on secondment from Jamaica College till 2021.
The proposed regulations also warn that teachers or principals who are active in politics can be sanctioned if they fail to follow policy directives or allow their biases to affect the implementation of ministry policies or the running of their schools. There is also a plan to outlaw principals and board chairmen at the same school from both being active in politics.