No bartering over state of emergency

THERE ARE times when it makes sense for governments and opposition parties to horsetrade on policy. Indeed, this newspaper has, in the past, recommended the approach to the People’s National Party (PNP) in seeking the Government’s embrace of the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ), the Holness administration’s opposition to which appear to have been anchored in politics rather than philosophy.

There are some issues, though, that brook no form of huckstering. The principle is either right or wrong, to be embraced – or discarded – regardless. Matters of fundamental rights and freedoms, as guaranteed by the Constitution, fall within this realm.

That is why we are uneasy with the reported intention of the PNP to attempt to barter with the Government over whether the Opposition will support the extension of the existing states of emergency. Although the party has since denied such intentions, the chip that the opposition was reported to be placing on the table, in exchange for its votes, was, apparently, the Government’s backing of PNP chairman Fitz Jackson’s private member’s bill that would cap the charges banks can impose on their clients for services.

Bank charges is an important issue that the last time it was at the subject of national debate, appeared to have significant public support. Mr Jackson’s bill, however, was voted down by the Government in February on the basis that many of his proposals were already captured in the central bank’s code of conduct for commercial banks and that others would be drawn in, for which a concept document would have been drawn up by June. Little appears to have happened on the Government’s side. That Mr Jackson, and his party, would want to revive the matter is understandable.

But that position ought to be clear and distinct from whether the Opposition gives the Government its support, thus affording it the two-thirds parliamentary majority required to continue the states of emergency in the parishes of St James, Hanover, Westmoreland, St Catherine, St Andrew, and Clarendon. The measures have rolling expiration dates between February 4 and 27 after Parliament, in early December, agreed to a one-month extension instead of the three months the Government sought.

States of emergency, which give the security forces increased powers of search and detention, without citizens having immediate recourse to the courts, have, for the better part of two years, been the Government’s tool of choice for combating rising crime, especially murders. The measures have been popular, largely on the perception, and the Government insists, that they work.

Indeed, after a 20 per cent increase in the previous years, murders in Jamaica declined by 22 per cent in 2018. In St James, which had become the poster child for killings, the number of homicides dropped 70 per cent, from 335 in 2017.

However, there has been no analysis of the trends to determine what particularly influenced the declines – the increased presence of police and soldiers in communities, for which there is no need of emergency powers – or the detention of persons.

Moreover, critics pointed to the minuscule ratio of detained persons who are charged with crimes, noting that most of the charges were for petty offences. They also took issue with the social profiling of most of those who are detained – young, undereducated, unemployed males, who are likely to be less capable of asserting their rights under the Constitution or the regulations governing emergency powers.

SHORT-TERM MEASURE ONLY

Prime Minister Andrew Holness has suggested that his Government may have to use these powers for up to seven years, which, in the absence of a clear and coherently articulated anti-crime strategy and a proposal for the overhaul of a distrusted constabulary, reinforces concerns about the continued diminution of constitutional rights as is the case when states of emergency are imposed.

The bottom line is, as the Constitution makes clear and the Parliament reinforced when it required a two-thirds majority to extend these powers, states of emergency are to be short-term measures to be used in the most extreme circumstances.

Crime in Jamaica is high and frightening, but efficacious crime strategies and effective policing can’t rest on long-term impingement on constitutional rights. And if that is to be the case, arriving at this decision can’t be on the basis of a barter.

Therefore, we hope that Mr Jackson’s denial that such a barter is on the table is indeed so.