Another hour of decision

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Another hour of decision
WIGNALL'S WORLD
Mark Wignall
Sunday, July 06, 2008


<span style="font-weight: bold">A great fallacy exists in the belief that a political leader can bring a nation to a level of consciousness in a society which places little value on the new ideals being proposed.</span>

Why should I be an honest man if being so penalises me? Why should I give a fair day's work for a fair day's pay if the chief union delegate spends half of each day curled up on a pallet sleeping in a quiet corner of the warehouse? Why should any man or woman spend one hour in a long line in a government office if the service being sought can be efficiently secured in 10 minutes, for a price, in a covered bus stop just outside the building complex?

Why should I brave the unbearable heat and the long wait in Traffic court to pay a $10,000 fine if I can locate a policeman willing to accept $4,000 to make the ticket disappear? Why should I not accept $5,000 offered me by a politician at election time when my experience tells me that most of the 'tangibles' that his campaign is preaching are nothing but hot air liberally mixed with the effusions from the wrong end of the bull?

Where in Jamaica can I find the great example of honesty being the best policy? Must I seek out every Jamaican over 75 years old and enquire about the antiquity of good manners, acceptable social graces and the lost art of being a responsible, law-abiding citizen?

If I become troubled because my country is skirting dangerously close to a terminal illness, to whom must I appeal and seek the needed medication? If in my confounded state I cry out to God and seek the counsel of His agent, I eventually become repelled by the force of the not-too-well-hidden dysfunctions of the church.


Most of us, I believe, are reasonable people. We have a family from where we first learn of the trials inherent in loyalty. We want our children to see above the clouds especially because we never soared to those very heights. Because of this we have an innate desire towards living in a peaceful community.

NO PEACE IN A BROKEN SYSTEM


When gunmen snuffed out the life of the heroic Douglas Chambers, many of us knew that the system was limping along and in need of radical overhaul. It was, if not all around us, then certainly pervasive enough to convince us that at all layers of the society outstanding issues of class, economic inequities and hopelessness were on the menu and would not disappear any time too soon.

It is the tendency of humankind to have huge numbers of those people who are weak, passive, and unperturbed by what does not affect them directly. On the other hand, those who are the true soldiers, who remain unmoved by thuggery and unafraid to meet the unknown, are dangerously too few.

Douglas Chambers fell into that select category to whom much is asked and from whom too much is expected. To many of us he was that vicarious thrill, fighting off the monsters haunting us and making us feel safe at every step along our life's journey.

Before any political leader can begin to address the poisonous blight afflicting us, he must endeavour to start the process of realigning the politics and the governance into a structure geared towards rewarding the law-abiding. As it is now, the law is indeed a shackle to operating at all levels and in most areas in this society.

WHAT ABOUT THE DOUGLAS CHAMBERS TRANSPORT CENTRE?


In general, I am not in favour of too much symbolism. In our political independence, much of what we celebrate is a crude, trivial appeal to the celebrating ceremonies instead of a feeling of pride (or shame) in the little we have achieved and the much we are capable of attaining.

For the present I would like to echo the suggestion of a Jamaican reader living in the USA that the Half Way Tree transportation centre be renamed the Douglas Chambers Transport Centre.
For each day that the murdering cowards walk past it they must be reminded that the reverberations of decency and forthrightness do exist even in as troubled a country as ours. As they look up at his name, a symbol of their inability to delete his name and mission must haunt them.

You, the sick side of our society will not prevail, will not be allowed to prevail and, if you are apprehended, your days will become endless night. Our political leaders cannot tell us that they are content to govern a society which they know is sick, and yet their actions are such to convince us that there is no crisis.

The Douglas Chambers Transport Centre must position us to believe that we have strengths we are unaware of. Even as too many of us celebrate our indifference to corruption, the centre must stand as a beacon to a better Jamaican, a more solid citizen.

MENDING BRIDGES OR BREAKING SKULLS?


On the assumption that no straight policing in the crime-filled communities of our urban centres can be a success without a parallel and integrated social intervention programme, the unpleasant conclusion must be drawn that policing over the next few months will be more about 'breaking skulls' than
mending bridges.

Unfortunately that is the exact objective of the citizenry at this time. And, as much as I want to see tougher policing, I also want it to be effective and within the law. I must also bear in mind that I have other ideas about how the fight against violent crime should be waged. But for obvious reasons I must keep those to myself.

<span style="font-weight: bold">The government/country has no money to pump into these communities, there are no significantly large plans to ease the economic burdens of the poor, the powerless, the hungry and the hopeless, and the police force is overburdened with trying to police in areas where the hostility level is uncomfortably high.</span>

<span style="font-weight: bold">In such a scenario, scared and underpaid policemen and soldiers faced with the wrath of a lawless throng of people, unemployed, underemployed and fed up with their perennial hopelessness will be a recipe for potentially another disaster.
</span>

The police force needs to begin the process of rekindling some goodwill. The operative word is 'begin', because it is unlikely that cordial relations between the police and inner-city residents will happen in my lifetime.

DARING TO HOPE AGAIN

&quot;Mark, I agree with you,&quot; a friend said to me. &quot;We are in s. street. We have a weak prime minister and a destructive opposition leader. Do mi a favour. Turn off di light when yu leave.&quot;

Another man suggested to me that if an election was called now, even JLP supporters would vote against the JLP at this time. While I have no reason to believe that one way or the other, the fact is, people are hurting. Where people hurt economically in a scenario where the PNP has established itself as more closely reflective of the socio-political personality of Jamaicans than anything the JLP has to offer, it is the JLP who will be on the defensive at most times.

In February 2006, Portia Simpson Miller raised the hope of large numbers of Jamaicans like myself who saw her winning the PNP presidency as a symbol of what was possible for a person from 'the bowels of society'.

It was a dangerous flirtation - this inflation of cheering for the wrong 'little man' into giving him a power (Portia in this case) that he was incapable of handling. Throughout the 'ketchy shubby' governance of Simpson Miller, her assumed mandate resulted in the effective end of Patterson's disastrous run, the fragmentation of the PNP and two successive electoral losses.

In recent times she has been getting away with her highly unethical and politically immoral habit of blaming the JLP for the price increases as a result of global market forces and price increases in the primary markets.

Many in the second tier of the PNP have been embarrassed by her uncontrolled outbursts. Annoyingly the JLP government has been failing to challenge her on such a simple matter, almost as if it has
lost its footing and is unsure of leading.

While we wait for the prime minister to address us fully on matters of our internal security we wonder aloud at the prospect of a challenge to Simpson Miller's leadership. In this connection where Peter Phillips is the only visible, viable contender, I am challenging both candidates to present me with a list of developments in their constituencies.

Just from what one can see, the constituency of South West St Andrew (Simpson Miller's), is easily the least developed constituency and has the highest rate of unemployment of the 60.

Explanations as to how some of us lost our heads over her in the years before 2006 must be considered as a long-term work in progress. As the president of the PNP and leader of the Opposition, the PNP needs to ask itself if the best that it can propel to leadership is, the person who has failed the most to develop her constituency.

Basically how can Portia Simpson Miller lead the PNP and hope to survive a challenge to her leadership when all examples of her 'leadership' are flawed?

I hope to hear from both camps this week as I compare development in East Central St Andrew (Phillips) to that in South West St. Andrew.


CAN COMMISSIONER HARDLEY LEWIN COPE?

Could it be possible that Commissioner of Police Rear Admiral Hardley Lewin was really 'fired' by the prime minister after which appeals from members of the Police Service Commission to the PM and Lewin resulted in him reversing his decision?

Well, I refuse to believe it because if I do, with the state of violent criminality as it is in Jamaica, I would have to conclude that our internal security is under an even greater threat than perceived.
The information that I have been gleaning from some members of the JCF is that Lewin has taken his army modus to the police force and it is not seen by them as a viable leadership option. This would contradict much of the information I had been fed by official sources.

As an interim move, I understand that a significant force of police and soldiers are about to complete a training course designed to serve them well when they hit the streets of our social and political garrison communities.

Increasing numbers of social scientists have become convinced that social intervention is not an option because of its costs, initial and operational. Some have estimated it at US$1.5 billion. The question is, if the government is convinced that due to the red at the bottom of the page, that social intervention programmes are unaffordable, what approach do we take until the investigative arm of the JCF is upgraded?

Certainly we do not have five or 10 years to wait on the results of these medium to long-term plans.

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Those who play by the rules.

Those who play by the rules.

TAMARA SCOTT-WILLIAMS
Sunday, July 06, 2008



I understand that Douglas Chambers has left behind a young family to mourn his loss. My condolences to his widow and his children and his family. I wish for them that his death be not in vain, and the work done by him to rid the Jamaica Urban Transportation Company of corruption and mismanagement and fraudulent, wasteful practices will be recognised in its proper perspective.


<span style="font-weight: bold">There were three comments made to me within days of his death that I found at once appalling and very telling of what our society has become.</span> <span style="font-weight: bold">The first</span> comment or question rather, was to wonder whether Mr Chambers was 'political' as if to excuse his death casually as we do in war: as mere 'collateral damage'. In other words, to accept political service is to have a death wish. Like you 'bawn fi dead'.

<span style="font-weight: bold">The second </span>comment was that he should have 'known better'. And a <span style="font-weight: bold">third passing comment </span>about his 'rough' personality and harsh approach being the cause of his untimely death suggests that speaking the truth, exposing injustice and sticking your neck out (rather than in the sand) is a dangerous situation. Blaming the messenger has become a way of explaining away Jamaica's ills.

That we look for any excuse to say what happened to Douglas Chambers won't happen to us is selfish, but not life-saving. Because we don't put ourselves out there, because we don't speak up when bearing witness to crimes of any kind, because we don't get involved we think we're immune. But we're not.

A million more civil liberties have been taken from us because of Douglas Chambers' death. We must not speak out. We must not aim to work honestly and efficiently. And we must not take a five-minute break to smoke a much-needed cigarette.

This is what we know: Douglas Chambers, chairman of the JUTC, was killed because of his efforts at weeding out the incompetence, cronyism, corruption, extortion and racketeering at JUTC which operated with half the required fleet of buses, employed twice as many people as they needed, and sustained annual losses of nearly one and a half billion dollars a year. Chambers had cut 300 jobs and was in the throes of negotiating the elimination of 400 more redundant posts when he took a break from union discussions to smoke a cigarette outside the gates of the JUTC bus park offices in Spanish Town. Chambers was shot 15 times. Examination of the spent shells reveals the use of three different calibres.

Douglas Chambers was murdered because he dared to take a stand against everything that stank at the JUTC: an organisation that had become the feeding trough of the previous administration. So let every political appointee to Government-owned entities and boards be warned.

If your mandate is to do away with activities and people which stymie your organisation and prevent the proper and timely delivery of cost-efficient services to the people of Jamaica, then continue your work and take heed of and speak loudly about any death threats you've received.

And continue to rail against the wind for as long as it takes to change our country for good. For Douglas Chambers' killers must be brought to justice. And the men who who attempted to take the life of Shalman Scott must be found. And thieves who are held up as 'standard-bearers' must instead be renounced. And those who seek to help the destitute amongst us deserve our support, not to be robbed.

&quot;In this time of crisis, strong leadership is critical,&quot; said the prime minister, while in Antigua at the Caricom's 29th meeting, and I completely agree. But lofty speeches in distant countries prevent him from facing the crises that his job requires him to deal with. And what is this 'vortex of the worst global cyclone&quot; of which he speaks? Sounds terrific, but if you ask me the vortex is right here. He certainly talks the talk. He now needs to walk the walk.

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Robert Mugabe, Douglas Chambers and normalising dysfunction

Robert Mugabe, Douglas Chambers and normalising dysfunction

CLAUDE ROBINSON
Sunday, July 06, 2008



So much has been written about the murder of Douglas Chambers, I decided I would forego another commentary on the deed and its devastating consequences for his family and friends, the wider Jamaican community and the state that hired him to do the seemingly undoable.


Instead, I thought of commenting on the re-installation of Robert Mugabe as president of Zimbabwe, after an election that-by all accounts-failed to meet the most basic standards of democracy.
The situation in Zimbabwe is distressing for several reasons.
For starters, President Mugabe continues to betray the enviable struggle credentials he earned by leading the long and bloody fight to end white minority rule in the former Rhodesia, and for exposing British hypocrisy and doublespeak.

The British had promised to mobilise resources to buy back lands that had been handed to the white minority, thus leaving the black majority landless and excluded from the mainstream of an economy dominated by farming of export crops.

The British promise was not realised, thus frustrating the land reform process and the gains of the political liberation process. This may explain why Mr Mugabe repossessed some of the white-owned farms. It may also explain why it is easy for Mr Mugabe and the leadership in the ZANU-PF to pin the label of British stooge on anyone who opposes him.

But it cannot explain why he has not proceeded with any real reform. It does not explain why he has systematically used violence and intimidation against political opponents leaving himself open to the charge that his real desire is for one-party rule, by any name.
This at variance for the more open, participatory style of politics that many African people are insisting on and to which many African states are responding.

Finally, an increasing number of African leaders are dismayed by Mr Mugabe's stance and would like to have a political solution that would, at a minimum, produce some sort of power-sharing as happened most recently in Kenya after the president tried to steal the election.

Despite the appeals of the Zimbabwe story, my mind kept coming back to the murder of the former chairman of the over-staffed, cash-strapped Jamaica Urban Transit Company (JUTC): Who killed him? Why? What are the implications?

On the first two questions, the police are still investigating so we do not know the answers, but common sense is pointing in one direction.

<span style="font-style: italic">Beyond the specifics of making hundreds of unnecessary positions at the JUTC redundant, Mr Chambers had stated that his primary mission as chairman was to root out the corrupt practices that bled the company of cash and made it impossible to provide a decent bus service at a reasonable price to commuters and a minimal subsidy to taxpayers.</span>

<span style="font-weight: bold">The implication is that he was killed because people who benefited from the corruption that had overtaken JUTC felt they had to stop him. </span>They feared exposure, an end to their loot or both. Of course, 'people' in this context could represent large numbers of persons. This may complicate the investigation but if the police cannot 'close' this case then we are in real trouble.

The murder also demonstrates the extent to which we have accepted violence as the norm. Mr Chambers had been openly threatened and, apart from an Observer editorial, it did not raise any outrage from the moral and political leadership in the country. And the police showed no interest in investigating threats that were publicly issued.

The muted response suggested that, as a society, we have come to expect certain levels of lawlessness and disorder as 'normal'.

THE RISK OF NORMALISING DYSFUNCTION


Two cases in point: Some weeks ago, one of our television stations carried interviews with businessmen whose livelihood was threatened by the decision of Industry and Commerce Minister Karl Samuda, to halt export of scrap metal until mechanisms were in place to ensure that the country's infrastructure was not being dismantled and sold for scrap.

All felt that the minister's action was disproportionate to the threat and, in any case, we will never have a perfect system.

<span style="font-weight: bold">One man, who asked not to be shown on camera, put it this way: &quot;We know this is Jamaica where you have crime. So the law is there to make sure things happen on a level base&quot;. In other words, the purpose of the law was not to prevent or punish criminality but to keep it in check!</span>

Next case: A front page story in the Gleaner July 2 under the headline, 'Don't blame me', illustrates the dilemma far more graphically.

According to the story, Spanish Town Mayor Andrew Wheatley and Superintendent Terrence Bent, acting head of the St Catherine North Police Division, were blaming each other for doing nothing about extortion being carried out openly at an illegal bus park in the Old Capital.

Seems extortionists have established the operation, forcing taxi and bus operators to use the illegal park for fees collected by the extortionists in open competition with the municipal park.

<span style="font-weight: bold">Mayor Wheatley insisted that the parish council does not receive revenue from the illegal bus park and so it was not a matter for the council although it was widely known that illegal activities were going on there.</span> One would have imagined that the goodly mayor would have been concerned about the diversion of revenue from his municipality.

<span style="font-weight: bold">On the other hand, Supt Bent reportedly said the matter was a parish council concern as no reports had been made to the police from the parish council.</span>
&quot;The operation of bus parks and taxi terminals is for the parish council. If it is illegal, they need to do something because those are civil matters, not criminal,&quot; the senior policeman reportedly said. The police would come in only if the council needed &quot;support to prosecute persons&quot;.

Again, one would have imagined that the police, who reportedly walk by every day and see the illegal operation, would feel obliged to do something rather than ignore the matter pending an official complaint from the parish council.

A social environment in which death threats to a controversial public figure like Mr Chambers go unnoticed; where he can be openly gunned down in the expectation that the crime would go unpunished; where a police officer and a political leader dither about who should ask extortionists to stop their extortion, is a society where the abnormal is becoming the norm.

In my view, we run a real risk of normalising dysfunction, that is, where the abnormal becomes the norm. But we do not have to end there. First, we must recognise that we are on that road and then resolve to chart a new course.

Columnist note: Last week's column, Pride and Penury, appeared without any of the usual identifications of the writer: by-line, photograph or e-mail address for feedback. My editors advised that this was due to a printer's glitch rather than any desire to make the comments anonymous.

The main point of that column was that Air Jamaica has become an unaffordable symbol of pride which could take us to penury if our governments continue to ask us to throw good money at it. A week, a new board and a new plan later, there's no reason to change the comments.

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