Delroy Chuck BY ANY real measure, Jamaica is not making much progress. Our economy and social services are in tatters. The infrastructure, roads, bridges, hospitals, schools, courts, police stations and most government buildings are poorly maintained and in need of major repairs and physical improvements. Worse, visit the inner cities and deep rural areas, and see the deplorable housing stock and surroundings of our people. People live along gully banks, in squatter communities, and packed in cramped living conditions that make human habitation an inexcusable disgrace.
Our declining and failing economy makes life miserable and reduces economic and social choices and options. When people get sick, they would much prefer the attention of personal doctors and comfort of the private hospitals but through declining personal income, many of these private hospitals are empty while the public ones are overcrowded. When people get into trouble, they can no longer afford private attorneys and many obtain legal services through legal aid. Now, the public hospitals owe tens of millions of dollars to private contractors and suppliers, and the government owes lawyers over twenty million dollars for legal services already rendered.
Indeed, the country is being buried in debt, not only at the national level by Dr. Omar Davies, but at every level of government as contractors and service providers are unable to get paid. Businesses and individuals put up large sums of money to provide services and complete work for the government and, having done so, are unable to recover even the money expended. Rural roads, residential roads and many main roads are nothing short of disgraceful and yet we boast gleefully about highways, to what? When we leave the highways, do we enter bad and decrepit roads and damage our vehicles from the potholes and uneven, bumpy road surfaces? Do we enter decaying towns and villages to meet protesting residents, who demand better roads, pay for work done or who cry perennially for justice? Is it any wonder that the country is overwhelmed by hopelessness and crime, chaos and confusion, and corruption and indiscipline are the order of the day?
To be sure, some people in Jamaica are doing well and want the so-called progress to continue. They are the ones who have benefited from large government contracts, have contacts in the corridors of power, and others who understand how foolish government's monetary policies have been and get rich, and richer, from paper investment and the prolonged high interest rate policy.
The vast majority of Jamaicans want a change, as while they get poorer and their hardships multiply, a few get rich and propagandise about solid achievements and log on to progress. Undoubtedly, if the country is not getting richer, and it isn't, then if some are getting rich most must be getting poorer. Just like gambling, if only a few win then most would have lost and, at present, the country is definitely being managed and led like a large charitable or gambling operation.
Once again, people have started to blame the rich man, or the big man, for their plight and feel that the government or those who can share have a duty to give and to share what they have. That is the beggar mentality, the slide into the deeper throes of mendicancy that is fast overtaking the country. People no longer feel work and providing better services are the means to earn a better living, it is much easier and more beneficial to beg, borrow and 'con' to survive in today's Jamaica. In fact, many of my constituents are unwilling to beg me any longer, as my response is to give them work for whatever they beg. Amazingly, some of them have the audacity to boldly inform me that they didn't beg for work, it is money they beg me. Well, the people are learning well from the government, as government ministers do not go abroad to look investment to create work, they go looking for loans and grants!
If Jamaica is to make real progress, we need to change the socialist mentality of our leaders and opinion makers who believe wealth must be shared, that the big man has a duty to take care of the little man, that the rich got wealthy by depriving and robbing others, that countries get wealthy by exploiting the resources of poor countries, and so on. We need to smell the coffee and wake up to the reality that wealth and riches merely reflect the production of goods and services, and why the countries with few resources are more likely to get rich than those with abundance. Countries with abundant resources feel the measure of their wealth is in their mines, while they wait on others with creative minds to explore and extract the wealth from the mines. Well, it is a fact of life that the ones who produce the goods and services make more money than those who actually own the resources. Is it not easy to explain why Jamaica is making little progress?
We are not producing sufficiently to earn our way in the world. When our government foolishly boasts of the solid achievement of hundreds of thousands of motorcars and cellular phones, is it not aware that the real beneficiaries are the countries and workers who make these cars and cellular phones? What goods and services are we producing to buy and maintain these cars and cellular phones? While we buy foreign goods and provide jobs and opportunities for workers abroad, what are we producing and exporting to create and sustain the jobs and opportunities at home. In truth, Jamaica can make no significant progress and there will be no wealth to share if we fail to attract investment, open factories, expand businesses, and produce cheaper and better than the rest of the world.
When we see the dilapidation and decline of our rural communities and urban centres, we must ask how can we turn the country around from this obvious descent into chaos and lawlessness. I strongly believe it can only be done through an improved economy and the creation of opportunities for our people to produce and create wealth. More importantly, we need to change our mindset to understand that wealth must be created before it can be distributed and shared. Until that happens, then we will continue to distribute and share poverty, hardship and disorder, and human habitation will continue to be a sad disgrace throughout much of our beleaguered nation.
Delroy Chuck is an attorney-at-law and Opposition Member of Parliament. He can be contacted by e-mail at delchuck@hotmail.com.
