…JLP too, says Desmond McKenzie
THE Jamaica Labour Party’s (JLP) Area Council One covering Kingston and St Andrew, yesterday officially started its campaign for local government elections which are constitutionally due by December 31 this year.
“I am now officially, today, kick-starting the Area Council One division re-election campaign into action,” Kingston mayor and Area Council One chairman, Desmond McKenzie said to loud applause at the council meeting at the YWCA headquarters, Arnold Road In Kingston.
“We’ve been ready for quite a long time. As a matter of fact, we’ve been at the starting gate and have been biting at the bit, waiting for the call. All the constituencies in Area Council One and all the divisions in Area Council One are ready. We have candidates in all 40 divisions in Area Council One waiting for the signal for the race to start,” he declared.
With the exception of the Brandon Hill division, where Deidre Martin will take over from Justice Pansey Nelson, the party’s representatives in each division will be as they were for the 2003 elections when the JLP won the majority of seats for the first time since 1981.
“We have all candidates ready but I don’t want you to take the performance of the councillors for granted and say that based on our performance, we (are) going to win back the KSAC. I have no doubt about that but I’m not putting anything up to chance. We have to work to win back the KSAC and we have to work harder than we did in 2003,” McKenzie said.
He added that the party intended to increase its margin of victory this time around by at least three seats, which would give it 25 instead of the current 22.
At the meeting, where minister of state in charge of local government Robert Montague gave a presentation on the administration’s policy on local government, the mayor highlighted some of his party’s successes since winning the KSAC four years ago.
“We have been able to double the income-earning capacity to 500 per cent in every single area of the KSAC. In 2003 the KSAC was earning $134,000 per year from advertising in the city. In the first three months, the JLP moved that to more than $6.5 million.”
He also pointed to the number of street and direction signs erected, public sanitary conveniences rehabilitated, roads repaved and drains cleaned under his watch.
