Constitutional reform in the Commonwealth Caribbean: Recent trends The complex and often controversial issue of constitutional reform has been at the forefront of public discourse across the Commonwealth Caribbean over the last two decades. The central contention, in this context, has been that post-independence Commonwealth Caribbean constitutions are not autochthonous, but largely reflect the legacies of British colonial rule and do not support a sufficiently robust conception of democratic governance (McIntosh, 2002). As a consequence of these criticisms several governments, though constrained by limited financial resources, have engaged in intense processes of national constitutional reform. This article will give a brief overview of contemporary processes in four Commonwealth Caribbean countries – namely, St Vincent and the Grenadines (SVG), Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, and Grenada. St Vincent and the Grenadines In late 2009 the Vincentian public was asked to vote in a national referendum on the feasibility of implementing as their supreme law the recommendations contained in a Constitutional Reform Bill proposed by the now defunct Constitutional Reform Commission (CRC). Of the many proposals put forward, perhaps the most significant were: • The creation of the position of President of St Vincent and the Grenadines to replace the Governor-General as the Queen’s representative • The replacement of the Privy Council as SVG’s highest appellate court with the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) • An increase in the number of elected representatives in parliament from 15 to 17 • A confirmation of the legality of the death penalty • An explicit statement to the effect that marriage is exclusively between a man and a woman Despite having expended an estimated US$4 million in support of what proved to be a seven-year-long constitutional reform process, Commonwealth Governance Handbook 2014/15 21 Jason Haynes Ministerial ‘recall’ provisions are among the most controversial reform proposals in Trinidad and Tobago John de la Bastide / Shutterstock.com
CEP template 2012
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