Leader of the Opposition Mark Golding is chiding Prime Minister Andrew Holness following comments he made that the ultimate leader of the country should not have any other citizenship.

“To be the ultimate leader of a country, to be the ultimate executive leader of the country, you should have no other citizenship. There should be no question by your citizens that you lead, that you have somehow split loyalties, that you have a parashoot should anything go wrong. That you may not be subject to the full force of the laws of the country you serve because you are another citizen of another country. You could always find a way out, and I think that is important. In the minds of every Jamaican, the question would be, is the leader of your country fully, holy, and solely committed to your best interest, and there is no other loyalty or interest drawing on decisions that they make,” Holness said.

He was speaking during a television interview on Monday, May 20.

Holness’s comments follow a recent revelation by the leader of the opposition, Mark Golding, that he remains a British citizen.

Despite calls for him to denounce his citizenship, Golding says the law does not require him to denounce his citizenship to serve in Parliament. The Jamaican constitution currently allows Commonwealth citizens ages 21 and older to sit in Parliament.

“Mr Holness’s proposals are not in the existing constitution and would violate the existing constitution. This is in keeping with his and his government’s unfortunate history of past violations of the constitution of Jamaica. It seems that the Prime Minister wants to make up a rule which is not part of the constitution or laws of Jamaica to suit his party’s political fortune at a time when it is waning. He has no power and no authority to do that,” Golding wrote in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter.

He said neither the Prime Minister nor the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) have made proposals on dual citizenship as part of the constitutional reform process.

“His proposals are therefore not in the report of the Constitutional Reform Committee and will not be in the new Constitution coming out of that process,” Golding said.

While chiding the Prime Minister for his position on Parliamentarians with dual citizenship, Golding called for the Prime Minister to disclose to the nation why his statutory declaration has not been certified by the Integrity Commission.

The prime minister’s 2021 and 2022 statutory declarations have not been certified by the Integrity Commission.

Politicians and public officials are required to annually submit to the Integrity Commission a declaration of their assets, liabilities, and income for each calendar.