IN the midst of mounting public backlash over his dual citizenship, Opposition Leader Mark Golding is standing his ground, insisting that he is compliant with the constitution and laws of Jamaica.

Golding, who holds both Jamaican and British citizenship, made the declaration in a post on social media platform
X in response to comments made by Prime Minister Andrew Holness about the matter on the television programme CVM at Sunrise on Monday morning.

In that interview, Holness said he is of the view that the position of any individual who aspires to lead Jamaica but remains a dual citizen is both untenable and incurable.

“It is an untenable situation, and if you intend to become leader of the country, whether as prime minister or any sovereign leadership, leader of the Opposition, to head the Parliament or whatever it is, you really should divest yourself of any other loyalty that you may have,” Holness said.

“I think anyone in that position would be untenable and not just that, I think it would be incurable. In other words, having gone ahead to say, ‘I want to lead the country’ ultimately and not having taken that step before, you can’t cure it afterwards because already the question is, ‘Why didn’t you do this before? Why did you carry us along and not declare this to us?’ ” Holness said.

He said that there should be no question about the undivided loyalty of any individual who wants to be, or is the ultimate leader of Jamaica — whether that person is prime minister or Opposition leader.

“To be the ultimate leader of a country, to be the ultimate executive leader of the country, you should have no other citizenship. There should be no question by your citizens that you lead that, you know, that you have, somehow, split loyalties, that you have a parachute should in case anything go wrong, that you may not be subject to the full force of the laws of the country that you serve because you are a citizen of another country, you could always find a way out,” Holness said.

He clarified that while he is not against individuals with dual citizenship constituting the Parliament, he believes once that individual aspires to lead Parliament, there should be a different consideration.

But in his post Golding insisted that Holness’s proposals are not in the existing constitution, and would violate the existing constitution. He argued that “this is in keeping with his and his Government’s unfortunate history of past violations of the Constitution of Jamaica”.

“It seems that the prime minister wants to make up a rule which is not part of the constitution or laws of Jamaica to suit his party’s political fortune at a time when it is waning. He has no power and no authority to do that. He needs to tell the country why his statutory declarations to the Integrity Commission cannot be certified,” Golding said.

Golding has been coming under fire from members of the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) over the past week who raised questions about his nationality after he expressed support for dual citizens being allowed to sit in the Houses of Parliament and reiterated his stance on Jamaica’s final court of appeal.

In pushing for the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) to be made Jamaica’s final appellate court, Golding also stated that it should not be a case where Jamaica has “one foot in and one foot out of King Charles’ yard”.

Those comments triggered several calls on social media for him to declare whether he’s both a Jamaican and British citizen.

On Saturday Golding had attempted to clear the air in a post on social media, stating that “I am a born Jamaican and have a Jamaican passport”.

However, he has since stated that he holds both Jamaican and British citizenship, the latter via descent from his father who had migrated to Jamaica from the UK. He reportedly said he has not renounced his British citizenship because it was not “legally necessary” for him to do so.