The People's Verdict: You were wrong!

• Almost seven in every 10 Jamaicans disagree with Golding administration's handling of 'Dudus' extradition request

The highly publicised and much-followed Manatt-Dudus commission of enquiry has apparently impacted the way Jamaicans view the Government's handling of the extradition request for Christopher 'Dudus' Coke.

A Gleaner-commissioned Bill Johnson poll found that the number of Jamaicans who disapproved of the Government's handling of the Coke extradition request increased by a whopping 11 per cent when compared to the views in the country last year.

The poll was conducted among 1,008 people across Jamaica's 14 parishes from May 28 to 29 and June 4 to 5, 2011. The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus four per cent.

Compared to April 2010, when 24 per cent of Jamaicans strongly disapproved of the Golding administration's handling of the extradition request, Johnson and his researchers found that the percentage of persons who strongly disapprove of the how the affair was handled soared to 33 per cent.

At the same time, the number of Jamaicans who 'disapproved' of the Government's handling inched from 33 per cent last year to 35 per cent this year. That change, however, is within the poll's margin of error.

When Johnson and his team of researchers last year conducted their research, 19 per cent of Jamaicans said they did not know whether to approve or disapprove of the way the matter was handled. But in the recent polls, the portion of Jamaicans who responded with "don't know" dropped to 10 per cent.

The data also indicate that the portion of Jamaicans who approved of the Government's handling fell from 24 per cent in 2010 to 22 per cent in 2011. Of note, the portion of Jamaicans who strongly agreed with the way the Government handled the matter was cut almost in half - from nine per cent to five per cent.

No misconduct

The Emil George-led commission, which considered the Government's handling of the request for Coke, said in its report that the commissioners found no misconduct on the part of persons enquired into.

"Mistakes and errors of judgement were made, but no one, in our view, was guilty of misconduct in the part he or she played in the matter of the extradition of Mr Coke. It is regrettable that the memories of some of these witnesses failed them at the enquiry," the commissioners said.

For nine months Attorney General and Justice Minister Dorothy Lightbourne delayed signing the authority to proceed with extradition proceedings against west Kingston don and the so-called leader of the notorious Shower Posse.

During that time, agents of the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP), acting on the instructions of its leader, Prime Minister Bruce Golding, engaged the United States law firm Manatt, Phelps & Phillips to "seek dialogue with US authorities" on the extradition request for Coke.

The commissioners said Golding's involvement with the matter was inappropriate. "He should have distanced himself completely from the matter. His failure to do this led to the unfortunate suspicion that he was protecting an alleged narcotics dealer and drug smuggler," said the commissioners in their report.

It also said: "The prompt signing of the authority to proceed would have prevented the criticism that the minister (Lightbourne) was deliberately delaying the extradition process of Mr Coke for political reasons."

Lightbourne had argued that she needed further and better particulars from the United States in order to satisfy herself that a case had been made out against Coke. The commissioners, however, disagreed with her.

"After the minister had signed the authority to proceed, she could still have asked the US authorities to provide further and more evidence, which the court might wish to have, in addition to the evidence given in the indictment. Such evidence would have gone before the court and would have assisted the judge in making his decision of the extradition treaty," the commissioners agreed.