KINGSTON, Jamaica – The country will have to wait until May 26 for the Appeal Court ruling on whether Portia Simpson Miller and the other four members of the People’s National Party (PNP) should answer questions in open court about the $31-million donation the party received from Dutch oil firm, Trafigura in 2006.

The court was originally scheduled to rule on the matter today.Court of Appeal President Dennis Morrison, and justices Hillary Phillips and Patrick Brooks on January 19, completed hearing legal arguments from lawyers representing Simpson Miller, PNP Chairman Robert Pickersgill, Phillip Paulwell, Colin Campbell, and Norton Hinds, as well as the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions, which is representing the Netherlands Government under the Mutual Assistance Criminal Matters Act.The appeal was brought by the PNP following Justice Lennox Campbell’s ruling, in 2011, that the party officials should be questioned in open court after the DPP tried unsuccessfully to question them in private.The five appellants were asked to answer questions regarding an investigation by the Netherlands Government into the payment made to the PNP, which was the governing party at the time, while it had an oil-lifting agreement with the country.The money was deposited into an account named CCOC, which turned out to be the acronym for ‘Colin Campbell Our Candidate’ to which certain members of the PNP were signatories.According to the PNP the money was a donation, but Trafigura said it was payment on a commercial transaction. The party later reported that the money was returned.The money was transferred to the account just prior to the PNP’s annual conference that year. On January 19, during her closing argument at the appeal hearing, Assistant Director of Public Prosecution Andrea Martin-Swaby reiterated that the common law rule dictates that all court proceedings should be held in open court, except in certain circumstances, and that the open court justice is enshrined in the country’s Constitution.However, Queen’s Counsel K D Knight, who is representing the Opposition leader, argued that under the country’s international treaties, individuals cannot be compelled to cooperate with requesting States and that the treaties have to be subjected to Jamaican laws.Further to that, he said the appellants have already indicated that they do not know anything about the alleged bribery in respect to Trafigura, and cannot help the Dutch authorities any further.