KINGSTON, Jamaica — The Opposition People’s National Party (PNP) is commending the Office of the Administrator General on the implementation of the amendments to the Administrator General’s Act passed under the previous administration.

“This bold and unprecedented move will make the administration of money and property held in the estates of deceased persons easier,” the party said in a release today.

In 2015, the then PNP government, through its Minister of Justice, Senator Mark Golding, designed and successfully piloted the far-reaching amendments to the Administrator General’s Act, which, among other reforms, tackled the longstanding and vexed issue of multi-generational estates.

A multi-generational estate is one in which family property has been in legal limbo for several decades, with successive generations unable to complete the court procedures and access what is rightly theirs.

The innovative procedures and powers created by the 2015 legislation empower the Administrator General to distribute the assets of these multi-generational estates to the current generation of these families.

In commending the Office of the Administrator General, the PNP noted that “this initiative will, at long last, free up the ‘dead lef’ properties of thousands of Jamaican families, whose prior generations died without having valid wills. This significant emancipatory step takes Jamaica closer to becoming an ‘ownership society’ rooted in social justice, for which the PNP has always advocated”.

The party hailed the Office of the Administrator General for implementing the social legislation, which it said will further Jamaica’s growth agenda by facilitating the productive use of more of the country’s assets and the creation of direct and indirect employment.