PRIME Minister Portia Simpson Miller last night summoned People’s National Party (PNP) faithfuls to a mass meeting on Sunday, July 8 in the Half-Way-Tree square, St Andrew, triggering the immediate conclusion that she is ready to name the general election date.

Using the minimum requirement under the Representation of the People Act, which governs elections here, the prime minister has July 30 and 31 to play with, July 31 being tantalisingly close to August 1, Emancipation Day and its symbolism.

Anything but the minimum would take the elections beyond July, the month in which she was widely expected to call her first general elections as prime minister and president of the ruling PNP.

Colin Campbell, a key Portia aide and senator, last night confirmed the meeting but refused to say whether the prime minister would use the occasion to announce the date for the elections, continuing the cat and mouse game over the election date.

“We will be having a mass rally, the prime minister will present the 60 candidates. The prime minister will speak, but as to what she will say, you will have to ask her,” he told the Observer.

Up to Monday, speculations were that Simpson Miller would have made the much-anticipated announcement yesterday, July 4, the 114th anniversary of the birth of the first president of the PNP, Norman Manley.

If she names the election date on July 8, she would also have bypassed the July 7 date, which was also suggested, based on an alleged prophecy by Prophet Phillip Phinn that involved the clashing sevens – the seventh day of the seventh month of the seventh year – July 7, 2007.

Under the Representation of the People Act, Nomination Day must be at least five clear days from the announcement of elections, and there must not be less than 16 days, nor more than 23 days, between Nomination Day and Election Day.

The prime minister has up to November this year to call what will be the 15th general elections since ordinary Jamaicans got the right to vote under Universal Adult Suffrage in 1944.