MANDEVILLE, Manchester – Mandeville Businessman Timothy Scarlett will replace the late Clinton Dietrich as the Opposition Jamaica Labour Party candidate to contest the North-West Manchester seat in parliamentary elections, which are due by October, Opposition Leader Bruce Golding announced last Thursday night.

Dietrich, who was the parish councillor for the Johns Hall Division of the Manchester Parish Council, died in late April in a car crash.

There had been widespread speculation in recent weeks that Dietrich’s widow, Doreen, would have taken up the mantle of candidacy but Golding told thousands of labourites at a mass rally in Grey Ground, just outside Mandeville, that because of “the nature of her job”, it was not possible.

Golding said Scarlett, who heads the electrical/mechanical supplier and consulting company Power Services Company Ltd in Mandeville, was well qualified, having been the campaign manager for Dietrich.

“He knows the constituency, he knows the work, he knows the organisation and I am expecting him to carry that mantle and I am expecting him to do what Clinton Dietrich would have done, which is to win that seat and bring it home for the labour party,” Golding said.

Scarlett will be up against the ruling People’s National Party’s incumbent Member of Parliament Dean Peart – the minister of local government – in the parliamentary elections.