Patterson Rejects Recommendation of Two-Tiered Vote for President

Former Prime Minister P.J. Patterson has rejected the recommendation of the Constitutional Reform Committee to establish a two-tier system to elect a future President of Jamaica.

Daina Davy reports.

Jamaica’s longest-serving prime minister offered his most strident comments on the constitutional reform process to a packed lecture room on the Mona campus.

In a wide-ranging presentation, Mr. Patterson offered candid reflections on the state of the nation’s push to end its relationship with the British monarch and establish what he described as full sovereignty.

While he broadly appeared in support of most of the recommendations made by the CRC, on the method to be used to elect a future President of Jamaica, his dissent was firm and public.

Mr. Patterson rejected the CRC’s argument that gridlock may necessitate a situation where the prime minister and the Opposition leader are forced to nominate separate candidates for president.

The former prime minister says parliamentarians should be forced to reach consensus on the important national office of president.

When challenged that consensus has not always been easy to achieve in Jamaican politics, the former prime minister drew on his own experience dealing with former Prime Minister Edward Seaga, who served as Opposition leader during much of Patterson’s time as chief executive.