PRESS RELEASE

For Immediate Release: Thursday, May 13, 2010

Leaders Must be Trustworthy

Each succeeding statement or disclosure, or lack thereof, on the ‘Manatt, Phelps and Phillips Affair’ is more disturbing and raises more questions than it answers.  The Prime Minister, the honourable Bruce Golding, admitted in Parliament on Tuesday May 11, 2010, that, in his role of ‘Party leader’, he had sanctioned the engagement of attorneys by the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) to, as he put it, “resolve what was seen as a treaty dispute between Jamaica and the US”. In the context of the ongoing extradition dispute this can only be seen as lobbying on behalf of a person charged with drug and gun running.  This admission is devastating for two separate, but equally important, reasons.

The first issue is the Prime Minister’s unconscionable decision to involve the JLP in a State matter.  This resulted in the high jacking of the process of negotiations on treaty matters being conducted by the Office of the Attorney General on behalf of the people of Jamaica.  This decision also resulted in the compromise of Minister Ronald Robinson, the Attorney General and the Solicitor General. 

The second issue is that the Prime Minister then led a process of deliberate misrepresentation of the facts.  The indignant denials in Parliament and on the media, the misleading appointment of Mr. Samuda to investigate a matter which the PM knew the full truth of and the initial attempts to make Mr. Brady a scapegoat, are all indications of a loss of moral compass and an abdication of personal integrity and responsibility. 

The Prime Minister’s behaviour and pronouncements since the admission in Parliament of his complicity in the misleading of the people make clear that he fails to understand the enormity of the wrong that he has done to Jamaica.  He has abused the trust of the citizens and compromised our standing in the international community. The fitness to lead of the Prime Minister and members of his Government has been irretrievably compromised.  A Prime Minister whose word can not be trusted cannot remain in office.  Jamaicans For Justice calls for his resignation. 

The good people of Jamaica deserve, and must demand, the highest standards of integrity, truth and accountability from all our political leaders and elected representatives.     We can no longer turn a blind eye to the nexus of politics and criminality and the deception and moral degradation that this engenders.  To do so risks the capture of our democracy by criminal elements and would fail Jamaica, our children and history.  

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For further information contact:

Carolyn Gomes – 382-8583/755-4524-6

Susan Goffe – 815-3648/970-4224