Ousted PNP deputy mayor allowed to preside over WMC meeting
Published:Monday | December 18, 2023 | 12:05 AMAlbert Ferguson/Gleaner Writer
WESTERN BUREAU:
Councillor Danree Delancy, without objection, presided over the first quarter of the Westmoreland Municipal Corporation general monthly meeting last Thursday, five months after being booted as deputy mayor in that parish.
The opportunity presented itself as Bertel Moore, chairman and mayor of Savanna-la-Mar, called the meeting to order, informed councillors that he had another critical meeting with the National Housing Trust (NHT), and handed the gravel to his former deputy, Delancy.
At the time of Delancy’s elevation to the chair, Ian Myles, the newly elected deputy mayor and the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) councillor for the Little London division, was not yet in attendance. However, even on the arrival of Myles, Delancy, who is the councillor for the Bethel Town division, continued to chair the meeting without objection, only leaving the chair on the return of Moore at the end of his NHT meeting.
In July, three former People’s National Party (PNP) councillors resigned from that party and chose to sit temporarily as independent members before Myles and Garfield James joined the Jamaica Labour Party caucus to oust Delancy on a motion that he failed to execute his duties as deputy mayor.
With the JLP membership at the time being four to the PNP five, Myles and James, who were self-declared independents, joined the JLP cause to secure a majority of six, where they elected Myles as deputy mayor.
The third PNP councillor, Lawton McKenzie, who had resigned from the party, abstained from the outing of Delancy and the subsequent vote for Myles on July 13 and has since returned to the PNP.
Delancy has taken the matter to the Supreme Court, where he is contesting whether the actions taken on July 13 comply with the laws that govern local authorities and bar the WMC from installing or acknowledging Myles as deputy mayor.
The matter is set for January 8 next year.