Jesus alumni Norman Washington Manley (1914, Law) and Pixley ka Isaka Seme (1906, Law) have had College meeting rooms named in their honour, following proposals from the JCR and MCR to diversify the naming of College spaces.

The Upper SCR has been renamed the Norman Washington Manley Room. Manley, whose portrait hangs in the Hall, was Chief Minister of Jamaica from 1955-59, and Premier of Jamaica from 1959-62. He became one of Jamaica’s leading lawyers in the 1920s and, in 1938, founded the country’s first political party, the People’s National Party (PNP), with the aim of securing universal adult suffrage, and self-government for Jamaica. After defeat in the country’s first elections, in 1944, it was not until 1955 that the PNP succeeded and Manley became Chief Minister of Jamaica. He was a proponent of the island’s participation in the Federation of the West Indies, and held a referendum on the issue in 1961, which resulted in Jamaican independence.

 

Room 5.1, located in First Quad, becomes the Pixley ka Isaka Seme Room in tribute to the South African lawyer’s remarkable life, and pioneering political activism in South Africa in the early 20th century, which led to his founding the African National Congress (ANC) in 1912.