Building a Better Jamaica

Published: Friday | February 3, 2012
Jamaica Gleaner

Member of Parliament (MP) for South East St Andrew Julian Robinson and rival Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) candidate in the recent general election, Dwight Nelson, have both committed to attend a thanksgiving service in the constituency on Sunday at the Christ Church in Vineyard Town.

Hosted by Pastor Ralph 'Jim' Parkes, the service is being held to give God thanks for a peaceful general election held on December 29 last year. The People's National Party (PNP) gained victory by 42-21 seats.

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Threaten to take to the street if minister fails to release money for drain work
BY INGRID BROWN Observer senior reporter browni@jamaicaobserver.com
Friday, February 03, 2012

JAMAICA Labour Party (JLP) councillors in the Portmore Municipality are expected to say by today what action they intend to take to put pressure on Local Government Minister Noel Arscott to lift a stop order on more than $14 million worth of road works in their respective divisions.

The councillors, who met...

BY ALICIA DUNKLEY Observer senior reporter dunkleya@jamaicaobserver.com
Thursday, February 02, 2012

MEMBER of Parliament for South West St Catherine Everald Warmington has urged Parliament to consider whether or not there is still need for a political ombudsman, arguing that the original mandate of that office has already been met.

Making the case in a resolution tabled in Parliament Tuesday, Warmington said that his call was also made against the background of the budgetary constraints and the amount...

Jamaica Observer
Tuesday, January 31, 2012

THE Opposition Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) is vowing to be strident in its defence of the policies of free education and free health care.

In a release to the media today the Opposition expressed concern at various comments from Government officials which can be interpreted as threatening these policies.

"The Opposition Shadow Cabinet says that it views these policies as critical to the long term sustainability of assistance to poor Jamaicans. The Opposition said that the Shadow Cabinet will...

Published: Thursday | January 26, 2012
Daraine Luton, Senior Staff Reporter daraine.luton@gleanerjm.com
Jamaica Gleaner

CONTROVERSIAL LEGISLATOR Everald Warmington wants to see an end to the public paying for accommodation, chauffeurs, gardeners, helpers and secretaries for retired prime ministers and governors general.

"Those types of fringe benefits and allowances, those nonsense, are to cut out," Warmington told The Gleaner yesterday as he sought to justify a motion he moved in the...

Published: Wednesday January 25, 2012
Damion Mitchell, News Editor radio@gleanerjm.com
The Gleaner/Power 106 News Centre

The Opposition Spokesman on Justice, Delroy Chuck, is urging the Custos of Manchester Sally Porteous not to yield to the pressure to resign.

Porteous has been facing mounting opposition from several Justices of the Peace and some citizens of Manchester, who claim that her appointment was political.

They argued that it is untenable for Porteous to resign from her post as...

Published: Friday | January 20, 2012
Erica Virtue, Senior Gleaner Writer erica.virtue@gleanerjm.com
Jamaica Gleaner

Opposition Leader Andrew Holness has omitted former Minister of Transport and Works Lester 'Mike' Henry from the 16-member spokesperson team he announced yesterday, while also relegating two other former ministers to sole roles as committee chairmen.

Holness, during a press conference at the Office of the Opposition Leader in St Andrew yesterday, named a slate of old faces, 12 of...

Published: Monday | January 16, 2012
Jamaica Gleaner

The hierarchy of the Opposition Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) sought to present a united front as they emerged from a marathon meeting at the party's Belmont Road, New Kingston, headquarters yesterday.

The meeting, which was also attended by all but five of the party's candidates in the December 29 general election, was called to examine some of the issues that led to the JLP's crushing defeat to the People's National Party.

JLP Leader Andrew Holness admitted that issues such as style of...

Party looks at factors that led to loss at polls
By CONRAD HAMILTON Sunday Observer senior reporter hamiltonc@jamaicaobserver.com
Sunday, January 15, 2012

THE leadership of the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) is expected to meet today with other key party functionaries as part of efforts to determine the factors that contributed to the party's crushing defeat at the polls on December 29.

Details of today's event were presented at a news conference on Friday by Opposition Leader Andrew Holness who...

Councillor, senator, mayor, MP, next?
By Desmond Allen Executive editor - operations allend@jamaicaobserver.com
Sunday, January 15, 2012

The Desmond McKenzie story seems to have no end. Each time the epilogue is written, he adds another compelling chapter, as if he, and not fate, were writing the script.

There is no longer any doubt that his is a genuine Jamaican political success story, forged in the bowels of the desperate poverty that was 1950s West Kingston and in the heat of...

I am vindicated — Bartlett
BY HORACE HINES Observer staff reporter hinesh@jamaicaobserver.com
Saturday, January 14, 2012

CAMBRIDGE, St James — Former tourism minister Edmund Bartlett retained the East Central St James seat for the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) after a magisterial recount, which ended Thursday night.

Bartlett won the seat over the People's National Party's Cedric Stewart by 174 votes — polling 6,382 to Stewart's 6,208.

At the end of the recount — which...

BY INGRID BROWN Observer senior reporter browni@jamaicaobserver.com
Saturday, January 14, 2012

OPPOSITION Leader Andrew Holness says the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) will not be bringing any 'nightmares' on the People's National Party (PNP) Government, but promises to be a strong, responsible and effective Opposition.

Holness said, too, that the Opposition will ensure that policies started under his administration are continued for the benefit of the country.

"... So you will see not an...

Saturday, January 14, 2012
Jamaica Observer

OPPOSITION Leader Andrew Holness has stoutly defended his decision to reverse the two-network requirement for the proposed Digicel/Claro merger last year.

Then Prime Minister Bruce Golding, in approving the merger in August, insisted that Digicel must continue operating two separate networks. However, this arrangement was changed by his successor, Holness, in the weeks leading up to the December 29 general election, but was not made public until Thursday when the Office of Utilities Regulation (OUR)...

Published: Thursday | January 12, 2012
Jamaica Gleaner

The number of homeless persons on the streets of the Corporate Area is on the increase, according to former Mayor of Kingston Desmond McKenzie.

In his final address as mayor on Tuesday, McKenzie said the number of homeless persons in the downtown Kingston area has now surpassed 2,000.

McKenzie, the member of parliament (MP)-elect for West Kingston who was first elected mayor in 2003, said he has also detected an increase in crimes against homeless persons.

"Some of them are...

BY CLAUDIENNE EDWARDS Observer writer edwardsc@jamaicaobserver.com
Wednesday, January 11, 2012

JAMAICA Labour Party (JLP) councillor Lee Roy Clarke, at his swearing-in yesterday as the parish of Kingston's 52nd mayor, bemoaned the fact that the Kingston and St Andrew Corporation (KSAC) was in charge of more than 2,000 roads, drains and gullies but had "virtually no funds to repair or maintain them".

Clarke, who represents the Whitehall division, was sworn in by the returning officer for...

Published: Monday January 9, 2012
Jamaica Gleaner
editorial@gleanerjm.com

A hearing is to begin today in the Cambridge Resident Magistrate's Court into the petition filed by Cedric Stewart, the People's National Party's candidate for East Central St James.

Stewart wants a magisterial recount of the ballots in the constituency on the grounds that there were glaring irregularities.

The Jamaica Labour Party’s Edmund Bartlett had polled 6,337 votes to Stewart’s 6,172.

His...

Published: Monday | January 9, 2012
Daraine Luton, Senior Staff Reporter daraine.luton@gleanerjm.com
Jamaica Gleaner

The Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) yesterday described Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller's decision to appoint three other women to the Cabinet as 'jobs for the girls'.

Simpson Miller on Friday unveiled a 28-member executive consisting of 20 Cabinet ministers and eight state ministers.

In defending the size of the executive, the prime minister had said: "If you check my...

Opposition firm on Caribbean Court over Privy Council
BY CONRAD HAMILTON Observer senior reporter hamiltonc@jamaicaobserver.com
Monday, January 09, 2012

DESPITE strident objection in the past, the opposition Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) now seems set to support plans by the Portia Simpson Miller administration to end Jamaica's relationship with the United Kingdom-based Privy Council.

The prime minister said that she would replace the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council in...