The new Parliamentary year in the Upper House started with unexpected controversy today.
Government Senators today used their superior numbers to pass a resolution suspending Opposition Senator K. D. Knight who was absent.
Senator Knight has been suspended for two sittings for describing as stupid the leader of Government Business in the House Dorothy Lightbourne during last week’s sitting.
The mover of the motion, junior minister for foreign affairs and foreign trade Dr Ronald Robinson said this action against the senior opposition
Parliamentarian would send a signal to the country that the Government side would not tolerate the member’s disparaging remarks about the leader.
His colleague Desmond McKenzie agreed saying Knight’s statement was disrespectful to Lightbourne.
National security minister Dwight Nelson also took Knight to task for brushing aside the ruling of Senate president Oswald Harding, last week that he should apologise.
However, Leader of Opposition Business AJ Nicholson described the motion as red herring.
According to Nicholson, if the rules of the Senate were being adhered to there would be no need to debate a resolution to suspend a senator.
His colleague Norman Grant said the conduct of the Senate had become shameful overtime.
Another Opposition Senator Basil Waite called the action that was being taken hypocrisy at its worst.
At the end of the debate, the Opposition called for a divide.
The motion was passed with 10 ayes, five voting no and five members absent.
Meanwhile, Senator Knight is defiant this afternoon.
He told The Gleaner/Power 106 News that he would not change his position or retract the statement he made last week.
This is the comment that Senator Knight made last week in response to the leader of Government business in the House Dorothy Lightbourne.
source: go-jamaica.com
