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Tavares Finson wants status of four national heroes changed to liberators
Balford Henry
Tuesday, July 08, 2008
DEPUTY president of the Senate, Tom Tavares Finson, wants the government to start a process of declaring that four national heroes, who were imprisoned in the past, were actually liberators.
Tavares Finson said that the four - Paul Bogle, Marcus Garvey, Sam Sharpe and George William Gordon - were branded as criminals by colonial authorities and convicted and punished.
"Why should we as an independent and sovereign people accept this designation," he told the Senate last Friday as he spoke in the annual state of the nation debate.
"We have the power to change their status and we should do so now," he added.
He said that while there have been frequent calls for a pardon for Garvey's conviction in the United States, his conviction in Jamaica still stands. He said that the actions for which they were convicted were not criminal acts but "acts of liberation with abundant moral justification".
"The government should formally recognise this. I intend to put before the Senate, at the earliest possible opportunity, a motion urging the government to move with all haste to, by way of a statutory declaration, say to the people of Jamaica and the world that these men were not criminals, but liberators," he said.
He, however, said that he did not intend to follow the process of seeking a royal pardon under section 90 or 91 of the Jamaican constitution.
"I could not, in all conscience, approach the matter in this manner. It is not that we are seeking the pardon from anyone. What we are seeking to do is to simply recognise the role of these persons,' he said.
He said that he will seek consensus in both Houses of Parliament, and has already started consultations with a number of academics on the issue.
Balford Henry
Tuesday, July 08, 2008
DEPUTY president of the Senate, Tom Tavares Finson, wants the government to start a process of declaring that four national heroes, who were imprisoned in the past, were actually liberators.
Tavares Finson said that the four - Paul Bogle, Marcus Garvey, Sam Sharpe and George William Gordon - were branded as criminals by colonial authorities and convicted and punished.
"Why should we as an independent and sovereign people accept this designation," he told the Senate last Friday as he spoke in the annual state of the nation debate.
"We have the power to change their status and we should do so now," he added.
He said that while there have been frequent calls for a pardon for Garvey's conviction in the United States, his conviction in Jamaica still stands. He said that the actions for which they were convicted were not criminal acts but "acts of liberation with abundant moral justification".
"The government should formally recognise this. I intend to put before the Senate, at the earliest possible opportunity, a motion urging the government to move with all haste to, by way of a statutory declaration, say to the people of Jamaica and the world that these men were not criminals, but liberators," he said.
He, however, said that he did not intend to follow the process of seeking a royal pardon under section 90 or 91 of the Jamaican constitution.
"I could not, in all conscience, approach the matter in this manner. It is not that we are seeking the pardon from anyone. What we are seeking to do is to simply recognise the role of these persons,' he said.
He said that he will seek consensus in both Houses of Parliament, and has already started consultations with a number of academics on the issue.