What is the difference between the ccj and the privy council

Saturday, November 13, What is diG? The Story Of The Gleaner. The Story of Emancipation. Thomas Get Its Name? Jamaican Castles. Behind The News. Murder in Jamaica It Name Wat? Unusual Place Names in Jamaica. The treatment meted out to Sir Brian Alleyne simply because he ruled against the government of Grenada is enough testimony that our leaders are not mature enough to select our judges. Add to that the lack of maturity in discussions in Parliament no less when the CCJ is being discussed, where the opinions of the minority are completely ignored, resulting in the president having to reject not assent to a bill or bills coming out of parliament regarding the CCJ.

We may well have overstayed our welcome at the doorsteps of this colonial out post that the Privy Council is. However, we still feel confident enough that the facts will guide the decisions and not familiarity or name dropping. I am sure that this dependence on a colonial entity is not what we envisaged when independence was touted. Yet many of us with reason coming out of our experiences still feel comfortable enough with the status quo to keep the embrace.

Does it grate my psyche to say that? Experience is my best teacher on this one. Frederick Baron Mahaut, Dominica. I understand the fears expressed by most writers, living in the caribbean is like living in a big village, and the expressed fears of politicians' interference in the judicial system.

Let me say we have to start somewhere and trust our intellectuals. It is obvious Mother Country England Privy Council will not entertain us indefinitely, and so we need to hold our judges accountable. Miranda Saddlers, St Kitts. It amazes me that we in the Caribbean are still battling if we should or should not have the CCJ as our highest court.

It's a real shame that we will wait till we are embarrassed by the British, when they eventually tell us that the service is no longer free to us and it will be fazed out.

Then we as a region would find ourselves scrambling to get our act together. Anthony Goodridge Bridgetown, Barbados. It is not just the Caribbean that is affected. The Privy Council provides such a service to all Commonwealth member states that have chosen to retain the Privy Council as the final appellate court - it is a lot of work, of which the Caribbean has been identified as a lion share of the workload.

Secondly, the Privy Council has identified that the Caribbean has an alternative, its own final appellate court, the CCJ. But we in the Caribbean fear the politicisation of the CCJ.

This is a teething reality that we must bear in the development stages of the CCJ, until we achieve a certain level of political maturity in the Caribbean, where we can appoint Justices to sit on the CCJ, though views may differ.

Thirdly, Jurists appointment is a difficult political issue everywhere. You hope that the court gets on with its work objectively after appointments, but appointments will always be political. The Privy Council may be independent in its decision making, but appointment is still a political process. The CCJ will have teething problems. Political maturity will be a while yet in the Caribbean! However, to get to that matured level where we can all accept the ruling of the CCJ requires that we begin now.

It is no excuse not to embrace the CCJ fully at this time! This is sad because the Privy Council have been doing an excellent job with our serious cases I am confident that most Caribbean nationals have my feelings.

Yes, I have confidence in our nationals, but it is our political ways that I am concerned about into the CCJ. We cannot and should not overlook this important fact. I am one person who believes that Caribbean people can achieve any thing but as always politics is our downfall and even the Privy Council members know this. I strongly believe that the new president of the British Supreme Court made those comments because of what they are hearing from some our nationals and politicians about leaving the Privy Council.

Having the Privy Council as our final court of justice does not mean we are not independent; to me it means that we are sharing in the term Global village and community. Yep, there is an international court and our countries have signed onto it as well, so what is the problem with the Privy Council?

Is it not the same thing? Let us look at ways we can get the best from our relationship with the Privy Council to better our local Justice Systems. James St. Kitts and Nevis. Can you imagine what will happen if and when we have the CCJ as the final court of justice? Caribbean politicians … cannot bribe or corrupt the Privy Council but they may do just that with the CCJ.

Thomas Archibald Cayon, St. Our former Prime Minister, P. Patterson, along with many others lobbied for the CCJ in our country, yet still the opposition at the time refused to see the positives of this move. It is often said the court would be tainted by political influence, and truth be told it is a real possibility.

However, its just one of the many glitches we will encounter when breaking free from old habits. Lets move on, don't let them kick us out, we should move on with some dignity intact! Danielle Jones Kingston, Jamaica. I think it's been a long time coming but I think the Caribbean is finally ready to move on from the Privy Council. We're ready and I think we will do an excellent job administering our own justice in our own courts.

We know the locale, we know the law, we have the experience, and the common sense. The CCJ has been doing a superlative job and will serve us well as a final court of appeal. Shivron Gay Nassau, Bahamas. I had thought that by now-almost 40 years after independence that the debate will be an evaluation of the CCJ-not whether the CCJ should be our highest court.

It has two jurisdictions: an original jurisdiction and an appellate jurisdiction. In its original jurisdiction, the CCJ is an international court with compulsory and exclusive jurisdiction in respect to the interpretation and pronouncements of treaties such as the Revised Treaty of Chaguaramas.

In its appellate jurisdiction, the CCJ hears appeals as the court of last resort in both civil and criminal matters from those member states, which have ceased to allow appeals to the Privy Council.

The birth of the CCJ came after a long and arduous period of planning by several countries and organizations in the region. In March , the Organization of Commonwealth Caribbean Bar Associations first raised the issue of the need to replace the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council as the court of last resort for the newly independent countries of the Caribbean by a regional Court of Appeal.

But ironically, Jamaica is not a member of the CCJ. One of the reasons for the establishment of an Appellate Court in the Caribbean was because several leaders, including the late Forbes Burnham had believed that the British-Privy Council had too much legal power over the countries of the Caribbean.

They also lamented that the independent Caribbean countries are the only remaining ones in the former British Empire that relied on the British-Privy Council for appeals.