Foreign Affairs Minister Kamina Johnson Smith - file photo
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Kamina Johnson Smith
Foreign Affairs Minister Kamina Johnson Smith has said her campaign for the post of Commonwealth Secretary General is being funded solely by the Government of Jamaica, as she dismissed suggestions that there is an attempt to conceal the information.
Mrs Johnson Smith was responding to a Sunday Gleaner report which stated that the country was in the dark as to the cost and source of funding for the campaign.
The report said the newspaper had tried unsuccessfully to get Mrs Johnson Smith to respond to queries.
But speaking Monday on TVJ's Smile Jamaica programme, the Foreign Affairs Minister said she was surprised by the queries since she had publicly made the disclosure about her campaign's funding during a radio interview weeks ago.
"No other government has contributed any finances to this campaign; it is Jamaican," she insisted, adding that her travel is "absorbed within the Ministry of Foreign Affairs that has a budget for these things".
Noting that she has been "blending the campaign along with work that I would normally do as Minister of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade," Mrs Johnson Smith maintained that there was no secret and "no attempt to hide anything".
'No bad blood'
Senator Johnson Smith has also said there is no bad blood between her and Antigua and Barbuda Prime Minister, Gaston Browne.
After the Government announced her candidature, Mr. Browne immediately reacted, describing the action as a monumental error that would only serve to divide the Caribbean, which had initially backed the incumbent Baroness Patricia Scotland for the Commonwealth post.
But according to Mrs Johnson Smith, Mr. Browne's comments were misunderstood.
"He is actually very complementary of my capacity and my abilities and I would say that maybe media can ask him for another comment at another time," she said.
A decision on the appointment of a secretary-general is to be made during the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting later this month in Kigali, Rwanda.
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