Much work needs to be done on constitutional reforms

THE EDITOR, Madam:

I am writing with reference to the letter, “Treat constitutional reform with urgency,” published in The Gleaner on September 20.

I am deeply concerned about the lack of the electorate reading and understanding the content and context of Jamaica’s 1962 (rev. 2015) Constitution. There is much more work left to be done to complete it.

The Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ), which was established in 2001, and the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council (JCPC), which was established in 1883. There are two types of clauses in the Commonwealth Caribbean countries’ independence constitutions that were in effect prior to independence.

The General Savings Clauses protect all laws in force before independence, regardless of how damaging they might be to fundamental rights. Section 6 of Trinidad and Tobago’s Constitution is an example.

Specific or Partial Savings Clauses are more targeted and preserve specific types of laws or punishments that were in effect prior to independence.

On December 12, 2022, Barbados High Court ruled the criminalisation of same-sex relations unconstitutional. Following in the footsteps of Antigua and Barbuda and St. Kitts and Nevis (English-French).

On July 5, 2022, Antigua and Barbuda, Eastern Caribbean Supreme Court ruled that the country’s law criminalizing same-sex intimacy was unconstitutional and void with immediate effect. On August 29, 2022, St.Kitts and Nevis, Eastern Caribbean Supreme Court issued a similar ruling, declaring that St Kitts and Nevis’s sodomy laws violated constitutional rights to privacy and freedom of expression.

The following Commonwealth nations have decriminalized same-sex sexual activity through court rulings or legal amendments: Antigua and Barbuda (2022), Bahamas (1991), Barbados (2022), Belize (2016), Dominica (2024), St Kitts and Nevis (2022), St Lucia (2025).

Trinidad and Tobago (2018), though an appeals court attempted to re-criminalize it on March 2023. The case is currently on appeal before the Privy Council in London.

The remaining countries where the criminalisation is in effect are Grenada, Guyana, Jamaica, and Saint Vincent and the Grenadians.

However, it should be noted that “Jamaica holds the Guinness World Record for the most churches per square mile,” a distinction often cited in various official and unofficial sources including the Ministry of Finance and the Public Service Facebook page. The island has a very high concentration of churches, with estimates of over 1,600 churches, making it a significant feature of the country’s religious landscape

Thus, I believe the religious votes played a significant role in the results of the September 3 general election.

CARGILL KELLY