Dr. Allen to Take Oath of Office on Thursday

Dr. Patrick Linton Allen C.D., will on Thursday, February 26, take the Oath of Office as Jamaica’s sixth Governor-General since Independence, in a ceremony to be held at King’s House.
Prime Minister, Bruce Golding, heads the list of dignitaries, who will attend the ceremony, which will begin at 5:30 pm.
Other invited guests include: Chief Justice of Jamaica and Chancellor of the Order of the Nation, Zaila McCalla; Chief of Defence Staff, Major General Stewart Saunders; Police Commissioner, Rear Admiral Hardley Lewin; newly-appointed President of the West Indies Union Conference of Seventh Day Adventists, Pastor Derek Bignall; and President of the Jamaica Council of Churches, Rev. Karl Johnson.
The function will begin with the reading of the Royal Commission appointing Dr. Allen as Head of State, by the Governor-General’s Secretary, Rose-Marie Gibbs, after which Dr. Allen will take the Oaths/Solemn Declarations and Affirmations of Allegiance, and Office.
Retiring Head of State, Governor-General, His Excellency the Most Hon. Professor Sir. Kenneth Hall ON, GCMG, OJ will thereafter present his successor with the Royal Commission, after which the outgoing Governor-General’s Standard will be lowered, and that of the incoming, raised, accompanied by a fanfare of trumpets. The new Governor-General will then be invested with the Insignia of the Order of the Nation by Justice McCalla.
Sir Kenneth and Prime Minister Golding will then address the ceremony, after which Dr. Allen will deliver his inaugural address.
Dr. Allen, 58, will succeed Sir. Kenneth, who is demitting office due to ill health, after serving for three years.
An educator and devout Christian, Dr. Allen’s appointment is a continuation in the line of educators, who have served as Head of State, dating back to Jamaica’s first native post-independent Governor-General, Sir Clifford Campbell, in 1962. Others holding this distinction are: Sir Florizel Glasspole, who served from 1973 to 1991; Sir Howard Cooke from 1991 to 2006; and Sir Kenneth Hall from 2006 to 2009.
As the Immediate Past President of the West Indies Union Conference of Seventh Day Adventists (SDA), Dr. Allen’s appointment will also bring to two, the number of individuals from that Adventist denomination, who have served as Governor-General in the Caribbean. The second is Sir James Carlisle, former Governor-General of Antigua and Barbuda, who served in that capacity from 1993 to 2007.