Minister blames opposition for stalled constitutional reform process

 

Minister of Legal and Constitutional Affairs, Marlene Malahoo Forte has suggested that the opposition's determination to lead the reform of the Constitution has caused the process to stall. 

 

During her Sectoral Debate presentation in the House of Representatives on Tuesday, Mrs. Malahoo Forte also suggested that Opposition Leader Mark Golding has backtracked on his original pronouncement of moving forward with the constitutional reform process on the issues agreed by both sides of the parliamentary divide. 

 

But in a response to the Gleaner on Tuesday evening, Mr. Golding said context was important, noting that at the time he commented on the issue he could not have envisaged that both sides would not agree on full decolonisation. 

 

Mrs. Malahoo Forte says there is now uncertainty on how much more can be achieved before the dissolution of Parliament for the general election.

 

"Beyond the quarrel...about who gets to lead - because that is what the real dispute in the constitutional reform work came down to - everybody is asking what can be done, and some want to have a self-fulfilling prophecy that nothing would have come of this work. On this side, we remain committed to furthering the goals of independence. We remain committed. So, Madam Speaker, because the process is a complex process that is set out in the Constitution, it is designed to be slow and it demands collaboration," she declared.

 

Mr. Golding has refused to budge from the position that the opposition will not participate in meetings of the Joint Select Committee reviewing the Constitution Amendment Republic Act 2024 until Prime Minister Dr. Andrew Hones explains why his government has yet to commit to adopting the Caribbean Court of Justice as the country's final court.