Marlene Malahoo Forte is making a passionate plea for all stakeholders to urgently get to a consensus on the constitutional reform process in order to have a draft Bill ready for Parliament by May.

“I want to table my Bill next month and it flows from there. If we don’t get the Bill in the Parliament, it doesn’t matter what other timeline we set. Let us get the Bill [through] because it’s the Bill the people must vote on, and it is the referendum that will make the change,” Malahoo Forte, the Minister of Legal and Constitutional Affairs, said at this week’s Jamaica Observer Monday Exchange.

Malahoo Forte, who is also chair of the 15-member Constitutional Reform Committee (CRC) tasked with providing expert guidance and oversight for Jamaica’s smooth transition from a constitutional monarchy to a republic, said the process is lengthy and tied to the general election so it is imperative that the Bill gets to Parliament as soon as possible.

“Constitutionally, the next election has to be held by or before December 2, 2025 because the life of the Parliament commences on the first sitting after the general election, and then you have a three-month span within which to hold it. So we know that it is December 2025 at the outer limit for election.

“If we table the Bill in May/June, it’s going to take at a minimum, about eight/nine months in the Lower House because you have a three-month dead time between the first reading and the second reading — meaning, between when you table and we start the debate. And then you have a second three-month dead time between the conclusion of the debate and the vote on it. That’s what the constitution says,” she said.

“If [we get the Bill] sooner than later in the Parliament by the next financial year of 2024/25, when the budget can be allocated, we can go to referendum,” she said.

The constitutional affairs minister pointed to a possible hiccup when the Bill gets to the Senate as no time frame is specified for completion in that House.

“That’s why I am hoping to balance [everything], because next thing you try to be disciplined and people tell you that you are a dictator because you’re trying to push it through,” she said, adding that there is no intention to ram the process down the throats of the populace. Instead, there is need for the country to get moving on the matter of severing ties to the British monarchy that has been delayed for too long.

She lamented that there is little discipline around speaking effectively, noting that “we are yet to cultivate a culture where we speak to the Bill and not extraneous matters”.

In the meantime, Malahoo Forte expressed how proud she was that Prime Minister Andrew Holness will be seeing the constitutional reform process through to a referendum.

“No prime minister before us was prepared to expend the political capital to hold a referendum, given Jamaica’s views on a referendum. Every time it comes down to it … the only thing [that is considered] is it going to be too near to a general election? Is it going to be a reflection on the Government, a referendum on the Government? And that’s why I say, big up to my prime minister,” she said.

The CRC, which comprises members of the Government and Opposition, the attorney general, constitutional law and governance experts, and representatives from academia and civil society, is required to help guide the constitutional reform process throughout all three phases of work, culminating in the crafting of a modern and new constitution.

Phase One of the constitutional reform process includes repatriation of the Constitution of Jamaica, abolition of the constitutional monarchy, establishment of the republic of Jamaica, and all matters within the deeply entrenched provisions of the constitution for which a referendum is required to amend.

The work is to be done over three phases.