By Vernon Daley, Staff ReporterMEMBERS OF the parliamentary committee looking at the proposed Municipality Act yesterday agreed to include a referendum among the measures the Government can use to determine whether an area should be granted municipal status.
The agreement came after a long, heated debate between representatives of the governing People's National Party (PNP) and the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP).
For the Government to consider municipal status for a community, seven per cent of its residents along with the recognised community organisations operating there would need to sign and submit a petition making such a request.
In granting municipal status, the proposed Act requires the Minister to take into account the opinion of the Parish Council under which the area falls and "the views of the inhabitants of the proposed municipality".
However, Abe Dabdoub and Pearnel Charles of the JLP had argued that the legislation lacked an objective basis on which it could be determined whether residents of an area desired municipal status and left too much discretion in the hands of the Government.
Said Mr. Charles: "I am not going to sit on this committee and agree to give a Minister the authority to sit with any group and take that decision."
He said the Bill should be amended to include a provision that would require that a referendum be held to determine whether a majority of residents in an area wanted to go the route of a municipality.
Dr. Paul Robertson of the PNP, however, rejected the proposal saying that it was too restrictive and would cause serious delays in the attempts to reform Local Government.
"That is an unacceptable proposal. It is not consistent with the policy of this Government and it would be an impediment to the people of this country to get municipal status anywhere," he said.
Agreement on the issue only came after the intervention of Professor Trevor Munroe of the PNP. The Professor agreed with Dr. Robertson that placing a requirement for a referendum in the legislation was too restrictive but argued that it could be included as an option that could be used when the issue of granting an area municipal status is contentious.
"It would be a matter of a great surprise that in the context of serious disagreement in a population as to whether they want to go the route of Municipality that the relevant Minister would not initiate some kind of referendum procedure," he said.
The committee accepted the suggestion and agreed that the Bill should be amended to reflect the point.
Yesterday's meeting was the first sitting of the joint select committee which was set up after the JLP raised several concerns about the legislation. The meeting lasted about seven hours and saw presentations from a number of persons who have been advocating for municipal status for the Portmore community.
Passage of the Bill is crucial to the long-awaited Portmore Municipality, which would allow the people of the area to elect their mayor directly.
On Tuesday, Prime Minister P.J. Patterson argued that the holdup in the passage
of the legislation was among his main reasons for postponing the Local Government
elections which were due by the end of March.
