EDITORIAL - Burden now on JLP

BY WITHDRAWING from the commission of enquiry into the Tivoli Gardens affair, Velma Hylton has not only shifted the focus from herself, but placed the burden on the Opposition to behave responsibly. The issue now is whether the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) and its leader, Andrew Holness, are up to the challenge.

Ms Hylton, we remind, is a competent jurist who has served in Jamaica and elsewhere in the Caribbean. Last month, she was named by the Government as one of three commissioners to enquire into the violence in the West Kingston community of Tivoli Gardens in May 2010, when armed irregulars engaged the security forces who were attempting to arrest Christopher Coke, the community's strongman and confessed dope and gun smuggler.

In that operation, at least 76 civilians died. Earl Witter, the public defender, said in a report on the incident that the prima facie evidence suggests that 44 or 58 per cent of the casualties were victims of extrajudicial killings. Mr Witter called for a commission of enquiry, with its quasi-judicial structure, to conduct a deeper probe in the matter.

party's approach

The JLP objected to Ms Hylton's appointment on the presumption of bias. The party highlighted her comments of a dozen years ago - about the right of the police to return fire on gunmen when women and children deliberately use themselves as human shields - when she was the attorney for a previous enquiry into police/community violence in Tivoli Gardens.

The opposition party's approach to the enquiry has been almost schizophrenic, which is perhaps understandable given the bruising it endured at an earlier commission into the then JLP administration's attempt to get the United States of America to back away from its request to extradite Coke.

First, it declined to comment on the draft terms of reference for a probe into an event that occurred in a community whose political loyalties are fiercely in favour of the JLP, and more important, whose outcome may help to redress alleged abuse and offer suggestions for breaking the historic cycle of violence in the area. When Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller invited Mr Holness to comment on the proposed commissioners, including Ms Hylton, the opposition leader did not respond. He said three days was insufficient time to do so. Mr Holness did not ask for an extension.

opposition campaign

Yet, the Opposition campaigned hard against Ms Hylton's participation, seeing her presence as vindication of its argument that the enquiry would be used to vilify Tivoli Gardens and provide the governing party with electoral fodder.

Having, as we expected, done the right thing by recusing herself, Ms Hylton, assuming the Government now behaves with prudence, has, unintentionally maybe, undercut the JLP. Ms Hylton cannot now be a distraction.

In that regard, we suggest that Prime Minister Simpson Miller ensure that the new nominee, assuming that she names one, is a person, in relation to the issue at hand, beyond reproach for matters real or imagined. Further, she should be willing to give Mr Holness reasonable time to respond to the nomination.

Having now engaged on the issue, to the point of having been willing to go to court to exclude Ms Hylton from the commission, the JLP cannot now extricate itself from the process, hoping that something will again develop in its favour. That kind of opportunism is worthy of neither the JLP, the people of Tivoli Gardens, nor the interests of Jamaica.

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