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All 63 seats in the House of Representatives 32 seats needed for a majority | |||||||||||||||||||
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General elections are scheduled to be held in Jamaica by 2025.
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All 63 seats in the House of Representatives 32 seats needed for a majority | |||||||||||||||||||
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General elections are scheduled to be held in Jamaica by 2025.
Minister of Legal and Constitutional Affairs Marlene Malahoo Forte said that Jamaica would transition to being a Republic before the next general election. [1]
The 63 members of the House of Representatives are elected in single-member constituencies by first-past-the-post voting. [3] Voters must be 18 years and over and be a citizen of Jamaica or a Commonwealth citizen. [4]
The leader of the party commanding a majority of support in the House of Representatives is called on by the Governor General to form a government as Prime Minister, [5] while the leader of the largest group or coalition not in government becomes the Leader of the Opposition. [6]
| Member | Constituency | Party | First elected | Date announced | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lisa Hanna | Saint Ann South Eastern | People's National Party | 2007 | 9 August 2022 [7] | |
| Date | Pollster | Sample size | JLP | PNP | Other [a] | Non-voting | Lead |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 26 February 2024 | 2024 Jamaican local elections | – | 47.8 | 51.8 | 0.6 | – | 4 |
| 24 November – 7 December 2023 | RJR Gleaner Group/Don Anderson poll [8] | 1,015 | 22 | 25 | 18 | 35 | 3 |
| 17 – 26 February 2023 | RJR Gleaner Group/Don Anderson poll [9] | 1,002 | 27.9 | 28.1 | 19 | 25 | 0.2 |
| 13 September 2022 | RJR Gleaner Group/Don Anderson poll [10] | - | 31 | 18 | 17 | 34 | 13 |
| 22 September 2021 | RJR Gleaner Group/Don Anderson poll [11] | 1,003 | 26 | 15 | 26 | 31 | 11 |
| 3 September 2020 | 2020 general election | – | 57.1 | 42.8 | 0.1 | – | 14.3 |
The People's National Party (PNP) is a social-democratic political party in Jamaica, founded in 1938 by Norman Washington Manley who served as party president until his death in 1969. It holds 14 of the 63 seats in the House of Representatives, as 96 of the 227 local government divisions. The party is democratic socialist by constitution.
Sir William Alexander Clarke Bustamante was a Jamaican politician and labour leader, who, in 1962, became the first prime minister of Jamaica.
The Jamaica Labour Party is one of the two major political parties in Jamaica, the other being the People's National Party (PNP). While its name might suggest that it is a social democratic party, the JLP is actually a conservative party.
Portia Lucretia Simpson-Miller is a Jamaican former politician. She served as Prime Minister of Jamaica from March 2006 to September 2007 and again from 5 January 2012 to 3 March 2016. She was the leader of the People's National Party from 2005 to 2017 and the Leader of the Opposition twice, from 2007 to 2012 and from 2016 to 2017.
The Cabinet of Jamaica is the ultimate decision-making body of the executive within the Westminster system of government in traditional constitutional theory. The Cabinet of Jamaica is the principal instrument of government policy. It consists of the Prime Minister, and a minimum of thirteen other Ministers of Government, who must be members of one of the two Houses of Parliament. Not more than four members of the Cabinet may be members of the Senate. The Minister of Finance must be an elected member of the House of Representatives. The Shadow Cabinet of Jamaica is seen as the alternative to the Cabinet of Jamaica, led by the Leader of the Opposition (Jamaica), and is charged with fairly criticizing and providing alternative policy to that proposed by the Government.
Oswald Gaskell Harding is a Jamaican former Labour Party politician, and the longest-serving senator in the nation's history. He was born in Kingston. Harding was the first person to serve as President of the Senate of Jamaica for two non-consecutive tenures, serving from 1980 to 1984 and from 2007 to 2011. First appointed to the Senate in 1977, he served in the body continuously until 2002, and rejoined the Senate from 2007 until his retirement from politics in 2011. His first period as a senator was the longest continuous tenure in the body's history.
Andrew Michael Holness, is a Jamaican politician, who has been the prime minister of Jamaica since 3 March 2016, following the 2016 Jamaican general election. He is leader of the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP). Holness previously served as prime minister from 23 October 2011 to 5 January 2012. He succeeded Bruce Golding as prime minister, and decided to go to the polls in the 29 December 2011 general election in an attempt to get his own mandate from the Jamaican electorate. He failed in that bid, however, losing to the People's National Party led by Portia Simpson-Miller, with the PNP gaining 42 seats to the JLP's 21. Following that defeat, Holness served as Leader of the Opposition from January 2012 to March 2016, when he once again assumed the position of prime minister. In 2020, the Labour Party won a landslide in another general election, and on 7 September Holness was sworn in for another term as prime minister.
Sharon Hay-Webster is a Jamaican politician. She was a member of the House of Representatives of the Parliament of Jamaica from 1997 to 2012, representing the People's National Party. She came to international attention after the 2004 Haitian coup d'état, when she escorted Jean-Bertrand Aristide from his temporary exile in the Central African Republic to Jamaica at the invitation of then-Prime Minister of Jamaica P. J. Patterson.
General elections were held in Jamaica on 29 December 2011. The elections were contested mainly between the nation's two major political parties, the governing Jamaica Labour Party (JLP), led by Andrew Holness, and the Portia Simpson-Miller-led opposition People's National Party (PNP). The result was a landslide victory for the PNP which won 42 of the 63 seats, a two-thirds majority.
General elections were held in Jamaica on 25 February 2016. The elections were largely a contest between the governing People's National Party (PNP) and the opposition Jamaica Labour Party (JLP). The result was a narrow victory for the JLP, which won 32 of the 63 seats. One political commentator described the poll as "the closest election Jamaica has ever had".
Clifford Everald Errol Warmington CD is a Jamaican politician with the Jamaica Labour Party. He has represented the Saint Catherine South Western constituency in the Parliament of Jamaica since 2002.
General elections were held in Jamaica on Thursday, 3 September 2020 to elect 63 members of Parliament. As the constitution stipulates a five-year parliamentary term, the next elections were not expected until between 25 February and 10 June 2021. However, Prime Minister Andrew Holness called early elections to ensure a united response to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. On the advice of Holness, Governor General Patrick Allen dissolved Parliament on 13 August 2020.
Republicanism in Jamaica is a position which advocates that Jamaica's system of government be changed from a constitutional monarchy to a republic. Both major political parties – the Jamaica Labour Party and the People's National Party – subscribe to the position, and the current Prime Minister of Jamaica, Andrew Holness, has announced that transitioning to a republic will be a priority of his government. In June 2022, the Jamaican government announced its intention that Jamaica become a republic by the time of the next general election in 2025. The process will include a two-thirds majority vote in parliament along with a referendum.
The Jamaican political conflict is a long-standing feud between right-wing and left-wing elements in the country, often exploding into violence. The Jamaican Labour Party (JLP) and the People's National Party (PNP) have fought for control of the island for years and the rivalry has encouraged urban warfare in Kingston. Each side believes the other to be controlled by foreign elements; the JLP is said to be backed by the American Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the PNP is said to have been backed by the Soviet Union and Cuba.
Jamaica is the first English-speaking country in the Caribbean to achieve universal adult suffrage and grant women the right to be elected to Parliament. Between 1944 and 2020, a total of 47 women have been elected as members of the House of Representatives. As of September 2020 there are 18 women in the House of Representatives, the highest ever. This is a new all-time high at 29% and is the first time that female representation in the House of Representatives stands at more than a quarter of the total membership.
Trelawny Southern is a parliamentary constituency represented in the House of Representatives of the Jamaican Parliament. It elects one Member of Parliament (MP) by the first past the post system of election. It was one of the 32 constituencies fixed in the new constitution granted to Jamaica in 1944. The constituency has featured in all 16 contested Parliamentary General Elections from 1944 to 2016. The last MP was Marisa Dalrymple-Philibert, representing the Jamaica Labour Party, who has been in office since 2007. She was Speaker and resigned as MP on September 21, 2023.
Trelawny Northern is a parliamentary constituency represented in the House of Representatives of the Jamaican Parliament. It elects one Member of Parliament (MP) by the first past the post system of election. It was one of the 32 constituencies fixed in the new constitution granted to Jamaica in 1944. The constituency has featured in all 16 contested Parliamentary General Elections from 1944 to 2016. The current MP is Tova Hamilton, representing the Jamaica Labour Party, who has been in office since the 2020 general election.
Marisa Colleen Dalrymple-Philibert is a Jamaican attorney-at-law and politician, representing the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP). She was the 15th Speaker of the House of Representatives.
Maxine Antoinette Henry-Wilson, CD is a Jamaican educator and politician, representing the People's National Party (PNP). She served as minister of education from 2002 to 2007.
Ivan Stewart Lloyd was a Jamaican medical practitioner and politician, representing the People's National Party (PNP). He served as Jamaica's first Leader of the Opposition from 1944 to 1949, minister of education and social welfare from 1955 to 1957, minister of home affairs from 1957 to 1959, and was minister of health between 1959 and 1962.
| General elections | |
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| Local elections | |
| West Indies elections | |
| Referendums | |
