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Minister of Foreign Affairs Kamina Johnson Smith continues to do a good job in her post and has an impeccable reputation.

She is a credit to her late father Anthony Johnson who was one of Jamaica’s finest diplomats.

Her bid to become Caricom Secretary General last year which saw her taking on Baroness  Patricia Scotland was perhaps ill-advised and one can see the wheels of politics clearly at hand here.

It has been said promises were made with Kamina Johnson Smith offered to thwart Baroness Scotland who was regarded unfavourably by certain parties in the British government.

It proved a bridge too far, with Johnson-Smith losing out and having to return to Jamaica with a bloody nose.

You win some, you lose some.

She is back at the job at hand and continues to do good work.

Not satisfied with that, there are moves afoot to smear here and nail her to the cross with technicalities surrounding contributions totalling US$99,000 made by Jamaica’s private sector to help PR efforts with her candidature .

It has been revealed that companies such as JMMB, GraceKennedy and the Mussons Group all chipped in to put a war chest together to get the Jamaican over the line.

Heaven forbid it was discovered that Johnson Smith’s party used funds for this from the national coffers. Then you would have some gleefully building the gallows high!

Finn Partners, an American firm was hired to provide PR and media services to help Kaminia Johnson Smith win the race to become Caricom Secretary-General.

Now you have an American with Jamaican ties filing a claim in the Supreme Court looking to cause Johnson Smith maximum damage. But why?

The suit which the American claims is doing right by Jamaicans both here and in the Diaspora reads: “ It is abundantly clear that the monies paid to Finn Partners Inc for its PR efforts in support of the first respondent’s aforementioned campaign was a gift/donation and is therefore governed by the requirements of the FAA guidelines for the acceptance of gifts and donations in kind, and the Ministry of Finance and Planning’s guidelines for the acceptance of and accounting for gifts to  the Government.”

Did Johnson Smith do something so patently wrong and did she actively go out of her way to deceive anybody? 

Some might say she was a stalking horse, taking one for the team-nothing more.

The suit which the American claims is doing right by Jamaicans both here and the Diaspora reads: “ It is abundantly clear that the monies paid to Finn Partners Inc for its PR efforts in support of the first respondent’s aforementioned campaign was a gift/donation and is therefore governed by the requirements of the FAA guidelines for the acceptance of gifts and donations in kind, and the Ministry of Finance and Planning’s guidelines for the acceptance of and accounting for gifts to  the Government.”

Is this move to skewer Johnson Smith for her bid for the Caricom position motivated by politics? Is this the real hand behind the marionette?
It’s hard to place such indignance. 

Johnson Smith is too gracious and astute to be seen to be giving this credence.

She has retorted with diplomatic aplomb stating the claims are “baseless, untrue and defamatory” and left it at that.

Kamina Johnson Smith has never been embroiled in repeated scandals, never one to play fast and loose. She is the type of senior figure one needs in a government, a performer on the world stage who is squeaky clean. There are no skeletons in this closet

Yet this seems like a take-down job, an effort to tar and discredit her. 

Could it also be a punitive strike for taking on Baroness Scotland? Not content that she lost, she must now be buried. Politics is an ugly business and there is always someone wielding the knife.

Wilfred Rattigan who it is said is retired and is bringing this lawsuit must have a big axe to grind and no doubt plenty time on his hands.

All you need to know here is what he told the press.

“This Government has said time and time again that it is a transparent Government. Well, you have to comply with the law, and if you don’t, you should be held accountable.”

Whose hand is really on this blade?