THE Election Centre yesterday recommended that the police ban all public political activities in the Corporate Area and St Catherine.

The recommendation was made hours after four people, said to be Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) supporters, were gunned down and a tour headed by the party’s candidate for Eastern

St Andrew, Dr St Aubyn Bartlett, shot up in Tavern.

Following a meeting yesterday between Commissioner of Police Lucius Thomas and a JLP team including spokesman on national security, Derrick Smith, and Colonel Trevor McMillan, chairman of the party’s crime task force, the JLP said that it had cancelled public campaign activities within the Corporate Area and St Catherine in observation of the ban.

But People’s National Party (PNP) general secretary, Donald Buchanan, said that his party requested that the police investigate the reports before imposing the ban.

“The PNP is asking the police to ascertain the facts and thoroughly investigate reports of political violence in the two parishes, to properly determine the veracity of allegations being made to the police,” Buchanan was quoted by a release from the PNP.

Buchanan said that while the party has cancelled a meeting set for Linstead, in recognition of the decision, it was still hoping that they will be allowed to hold tomorrow night’s final rally in Cross Roads, Kingston.

Last night, Smith, who is the JLP’s deputy leader for the Corporate Area, said that the party agreed with the decision and cancelled all engagements this weekend in Kingston, St Andrew and St Catherine.

“We are having no public gatherings, no motorcades and no rallies,” Smith said.

These include today’s tour of South Central, East Central and North East St Catherine by JLP leader, Bruce Golding, and a major public meeting which had been scheduled for Spanish Town.

But, up to press time last night, the police had not issued any statement confirming the ban, and senior officers were not available for comment.

Yesterday’s meeting between the police commissioner and the JLP’s representatives followed a request from the party. Thomas was accompanied by deputy commissioners Linval Bailey and Charles Scarlett, and Assistant Commissioner Glen Hinds.

The JLP, in a press release yesterday, expressed concern about “several attacks on party supporters and the upsurge of violence over the last 24 hours”.

“The JLP is of the view that these incidents are, in effect, a deliberate strategy to use violence and terror to intimidate JLP workers and supporters,” the release said.

The party said, however, that it was calling on its supporters to “resist the urge to retaliate and to remain resolute in the face of these attacks.”

The release listed four incidents occurring on Wednesday, which it said involved its supporters, as follows:

. At approximately 4:00 pm in Bunkers Hill, Northern Clarendon, several supporters of its candidate Laurie Broderick, on their way to join a motorcade led by Golding, were blockaded and severely beaten;

. At approximately 8:08 pm in Tavern, Eastern St Andrew, the candidate, Dr St Aubyn Bartlett, and his supporters came under heavy gunfire during a visit to the area. Three supporters were shot and injured and three vehicles were damaged;

. At approximately 3:30 pm and 6:00 pm in Canterbury, North West St James, three JLP workers were shot in separate drive-by shootings at the same location;

. At approximately 10:00 pm in Frazer’s Content, West Central St Catherine, two patrons at a bar owned by Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) councillor for Beleview, Alvin Beckford – Special Corporal Gareth Smith, 48, of Royal Place, and Gladstone Findley, of Frazer’s Content – were shot dead by gunmen shortly after 10:00 pm. Smith had 26 gunshots all over his body -15 to his lower body and 11 to his upper body – and his face was almost unrecognisable.

At approximately 10:30 pm, in Knollis, East Central St Catherine, Brandon Vernon, a driver employed to the party’s candidate Leslie Campbell, and Karen Baldin, a 24-year-old bartender, were shot dead by a gunman inside the Exena Pub.