Prime Minister Andrew Holness has put the country on polling alert, as the nation goes to vote at the 2025 General Election on September 3.

Nomination Day will be next Monday, August 18.

The Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) leader, arriving to a crowd thousands strong in Half-Way Tree, St Andrew on Sunday (August 10), touched on stage around 8:12 pm to rapturous cheers.

In a flamboyant, drone-flying, party-esque atmosphere brimming with political energy, Holness and the JLP’s top brass stood for the party anthem ‘Equal Rights’ as it blared from the speakers and chants of ‘Call it Anju, call it!’ echoed in Half-Way Tree square.

With a full complement of 63 candidates to contest the upcoming general election, the prime minister pointed out that in accordance with the Jamaican Constitution, Parliament is to be dissolved in the coming weeks to allow for the election process.

What’s more, local government by-elections in the Chancery Hall, Denham Town, Severight Gardens and Olympic Gardens divisions will be contested concurrently on September 3.

This announcement capped a showboating JLP mass rally, which served to officially introduce a slate of seasoned veterans and fresh challengers to the voting populace for a party-historic third term in power.

It was an umbrellas-up event, as late afternoon showers soaked the ‘flood’ of around 30,000 green-clad supporters, who inundated Constant Spring Road to the historic Half -Way Tree clock.

“I am overwhelmed… It is clear that the people of Jamaica have to agree that the Jamaica Labour Party is a performing government, a government that has delivered. We have been able to deliver for the people, because we are a party that believe in hard work,” an emotional Dr Holness said after he graced the stage on Sunday and began his address.

The opposing People’s National Party (PNP) had planned to host a similar event with their party supporters two miles away in Cross Roads, but that event was postponed last Friday, as they expressed a concern of a potential clash between green and orange party supporters, given the close proximity in distance between the two locations.

The JLP is seeking a third term in office. They were victorious in the last general election held on September 3, 2020, where the JLP won the majority with 49 of 63 seats.

In 2016, the JLP, under the leadership of Holness for the first time, won with a narrow 33 of the country’s 63 seats in a vote with a 47 per cent turnout, beating the then-PNP Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller.