This past August scores of young Jamaicans who live overseas, as well as young people born abroad to Jamaican parents, met in Kingston for a major conference hosted by the Jamaican Government.

The main theme of this get-together for this group, hailed as future leaders, was to help prime the engagement of this younger set of Jamaicans in the diaspora with their home country. It made sense.

For the Golding government, like the previous administration, appreciates the potential resource, political and economic, that resides in Jamaicans - in its widest interpretation - who live abroad. Indeed, in recent years, Jamaican administrations have talked about it a lot and are pledged to the building of institutions to support a concept of what we might loosely refer to as the Greater Jamaica.

Indeed, next month hundreds of Jamaicans who live in the United States will gather in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, for a meeting of the diaspora in that country. As with similar gatherings in other countries, we expect that high Jamaican government officials, particularly Dr Ronald Robinson, the junior foreign minister who has been given the responsibility to address the conference, will declare the esteem and importance with which Jamaicans view our citizens abroad.

High-minded statements

Unfortunately, much of what is said about the diaspora movement, for all the high-minded statements, has remained mere talk. Our governments, have, by and large, been unable to translate intent into effective action. What is apparent, however, is the lack of success in clearly defining what, in specific terms, is expected from the diaspora and how Jamaicans abroad ought to interface with those of us living on the island. And we can't, from a standpoint of constitutional governance, seem to even get started.

Take the case of the Joint Select Committee of Parliament on Diaspora Affairs, that was named in March 2008. It has not met since, unless it was in camera and the mere fact of its meeting classified, or even labelled top secret information. The named members of that committee were: Dr Robinson, Dennis Meadows, Hyacinth Bennett, Warren Newby, Sandrea Falconer, Shahine Robinson, J.C. Hutchinson, St Aubyn Bartlett, George Hylton, Morais Guy and Maxine Henry-Wilson.

Parliamentary representation

Among its terms of reference was to determine a national approach to policy on diaspora matters as well as propose constitutional amendments or other policy shifts on parliamentary representation for people in the diaspora.

It seems to us that this joint select committee would have been a useful vehicle for dispassionate debate, involving a wider public intervention, on the dual citizenship issue and parliamentary representation that dominated political discourse for several months.

Discussion of the matter might, in the context of the parliamentary committee, have prevented the issue of the efficacy of the constitutional bar on Jamaicans who also owe allegiance to countries other than Commonwealth nations from descending into political vaudeville.

Moreover, it would not be unreasonable to interpret the failure of the committee to meet as disrespect for the Jamaican diaspora and an indication of our willingness to do the hard work that comes after the talk. It is also a slap in the face of parliamentary procedure.

The opinions on this page, except for the above, do not necessarily reflect the views of The Gleaner. To respond to a Gleaner editorial, email us: editor@gleanerjm.com or fax: 922-6223. Responses should be no longer than 400 words. Not all responses will be published.