The Jamaica Labour Party’s manifesto proposal to subject appointments to the Judiciary and the heads of the various public services commissions to a two-thirds majority vote of both Houses of Parliament appears unconstitutional and will result in the politicising of those positions as they would be subject to a virtual “trial by politicians”, says outgoing PNP Senator and Justice Minister Mark Golding.

“The JLP’s Manifesto proposal to subject certain constitutionally entrenched appointments to the approval of both Houses of Parliament, by a two-thirds majority including the chief justice, the president of the Court of Appeal, the Judicial Services Commission, Public Services Commission and the Police Services Commission which are charged with approving appointments to the various bodies, appears on the face of it to be unconstitutional,” said Golding.

“The JLP position is inconsistent and incompatible… and we have a concern about this, given the recent resignation letters fiasco when undated resignation letters were demanded of JLP senators in what was ruled to be a violation of the Constitution,” said Golding today at a PNP media briefing at his party’s headquarters at 89 Old Hope Road.

“The JLP has not said that they intend to amend the Constitution….and I would point out that the chief justice, president of the Court of Appeal or Public Services Commission for example, those are entrenched provisions. Those provisions are in the Constitution to ensure the independence of our judiciary and to protect them from political interference,” noted the justice minister.

Golding observed that the provisions had “worked well over the years. There has been no call to change them. We (PNP) are not in favour of any system that would subject the appointment of the highest jurists, judicial officers of the land to a trial in Gordon House by politicians. We regard that as compromising the independence of the judiciary and is not in keeping with the separation of powers which is fundamental to our Constitution.

“We note that it is a model that exists in a form in the United States of America. That is no reason to try to adopt it here. This is a small society and we can see that with the appointment that is now going to be necessary to replace (Supreme Court) Justice Scalia in the USA who has died…that it is going to be a highly politicised process over there and they are likely to have a vacancy perhaps for more than a year,” Golding stated.

Golding said the PNP did not regard the politicisation of the posts as appropriate, “those appointments should not be politicised”, he added.