No answer on crime

THE MOST useful thing that can be said about the new round of discussions on the country's crime problem is that it has served to refocus attention on real issues.

For a while we ran the risk of being mired in the trivia of discussing the Prime Minister's sexual preferences. While this might have served to divert attention, at the end of the day the issues that confront the country remain.

Since the start of this year 457 of our fellow citizens have died violently; this in a society with no declared civil war, and with no known insurrectionist or terrorist organisation.

This past week there was the gunslaying of another priest, the second in seven months. The weekend was particularly bloody with six persons dying violently and three policemen receiving gunshot wounds. Newspaper reports over the weekend provided another indicator of the lawlessness, which is now endemic with the news that two men were executed in the Waterhouse area after being found guilty in a 'jungle court' conducted by 'area dons'.

It was also over the weekend that private sector leaders said that they had found Prime Minister Patterson's latest statement about the crime problem "vague and uninspiring". And, as the President of the Jamaica Exporters Association Beverly Lopez put it, "the Prime Minister has said nothing that speaks to any new thinking".

What the Prime Minister had to say in response to the latest wave of concern from the business sector must rank as the understatement of the year if not the decade. Mr. Patterson is said to have acknowledged that the country's murder rate was of great concern. But it has been of great concern for close on two decades.

Acknowledging a concern at this stage suggests that Mr. Patterson and his administration are at their wit's end and are devoid of any new thinking to address the problem.

When a political administration finds itself in that position the honourable thing to do is to submit itself to the will of the electorate.

The opinions on this page, except for the above, do not necessarily reflect the views of The Gleaner.

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