Don Robotham, ContributorTHE MOST important task facing the Jamaican people at the present time is to put unity first in our fight against organised crime. If anyone had any doubt about how important this issue was they only had to observe the reaction of parliamentarians and others to the declaration of Emancipation Park. Not all parliamentarians be it noted: Prime Minister Patterson and Dr. Horace Chang distinguished themselves by their appeals to reason. Mr. Golding, our usually talkative Leader of the Opposition, was again missing in action!
The lesson of all of this is the following: Unity does not come naturally in Jamaican society, even at the eleventh hour and when faced with a dire crisis. Unity has to be fought for and worked for. Unity has to be actively constructed. We have to focus on building and strengthening this unity in a single-minded way.
All of us as Jamaicans have to play our part in helping to establish and strengthen this unity, precisely because of the many potential disagreements and reservations which exist. The media in particular have a special responsibility to appreciate this potential for disunity and to combat it: They have to show exemplary moderation and judgment in how they present the activities of both criminals, inner-city demonstrations and the various pronouncements of politicians and other public figures. There is one leading Jamaican electronic media house whose website breaks all records for provocative political partisanship and stupidity - and it is neither the Gleaner, nor Power 106, nor the Observer. In this kind of contentious environment, it is easy to ignite controversy unintentionally by some silly sensationalist headline or thoughtless news programme and to foster hesitation, cynicism and doubt. But we need every ounce of unity we can muster if we are to defeat organised crime.
THE GARRISON CONCEPT
The point to note about the criticisms which some have made about the PSOJ's (Private Sector Organisation of Jamaica) actions in the past week is not that these criticism are without merit. Yes, the PSOJ should have acted earlier. Yes, a solution must be found to the very difficult problem of getting private sector people to name extortionists. Yes, the private sector should long ago have taken up the initiative of the public defender, Mr. Howard Hamilton, to start a substantial social investment fund and it certainly needs to do so now, as a matter of urgency.
Yes, if one goes back to the bulldozing of Back-O-Wall in 1964 and the construction of Tivoli Gardens - remember that first State of Emergency, memories of which some seek to erase - it is quite obvious that some of the largest operators in the private sector played a key role in either explicitly or implicitly giving material, moral and political support to the emergence of that model garrison. That was the real watershed in the history of garrison political violence in Jamaica. They saw this act as a necessary counterweight to turn back the People's National Party's (PNP) dominance of the corporate area and the strategy worked!
Yes, other parts of the private sector sympathetic to the PNP gave similar moral and material support to the counter-mobilisation of the PNP garrisons in Arnett Gardens after 1972. And thus the stage was set. Yes, right at this very moment as you read this, there are prominent members of the private sector who sit on the boards of various political 'trusts' on both the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) and PNP sides.
THE LINK
The political trusts are key mechanisms for linking respectable uptown big men with inner-city constituencies in all manner of clientelistic relations. Some of these are wholesome and innocent, but that is not the point. Yes, uptown Jamaica does not hesitate to attend elegant banquets far from the madding ghetto crowd (they are for 'passa passa later!), honoring leading garrison builders, even as they denounce them through the other side of their mouths.
But the hypocrisy goes deeper than the critics think. Nobody in the private sector or in Jamaican civil society as a whole (apart from stalwarts such as the late Gloria Cumper and her associates in the social work community) objected strenuously when the totalitarian concept of the garrison was elaborated intellectually and implemented practically in Jamaica.
The previous Jamaica welfare approaches were ridiculed as amateurish and in any case controlled by the PNP-sympathetic middle class. They were eviscerated. No hesitation to dismantle in that case!
The new 'professional' efforts were lauded as the very model of modern social renewal. Even today they still evoke compliments from all sorts of quarters who then turn around and lament the emergence of garrisons! One wonders if the brain of such people is fully connected.
THE MODEL GARRISON
This garrison concept is the deeply corrupting and corrupt idea of the urban constituency organised along the following lines: the MP controls the school and the school board; the MP controls and provides the health services; the MP controls and provides trade training; the MP controls access to employment; the MP controls housing and rights to remain in the community; the MP controls sports and sponsors sound systems, recording sessions and dances; the MP controls up to religious activities and rituals!
In this, the model garrison, no independent civil society is tolerated, every department of social life is controlled from the top down. It is a total institution and the MP is the totalitarian master. Note, it is the MP and not the party which is the power and certainly not the state, in spite of the fact that the entire operation is largely financed with state funds derived from the long-suffering taxpayer. Stalin would have been impressed.
Whatever the intent, as a practical matter and given Jamaican individualism, such a concept of the total constituency could not have been implemented without armed enforcers to give it teeth. Now the teeth are biting us back and threatening to bite some of these MPs also. So, the political logic of this concept led inevitably to the entire project being dominated by gangsters and organized crime. In this sordid context, the MP even had the shamelessness to play the part of religious figures in folk rituals. The cultural manipulation reached new heights of cynicism which literally took one's breath away! Have no illusions about such people! Stay away from their banquets! Do not be seduced by their suavely sardonic humour, bought at our expense!
Oh, there is much that the private sector and Jamaican civil society have to answer for - of that there can be little doubt. Tongue cannot tell, as they say. But not only the private sector.
Who in Jamaica has clean hands? Who can honestly say that there is no action or inaction that they have or have not taken in the post-independence period of our public life that they do not now deeply regret?
UNITY FIRST
Therefore, not withstanding all these sins of omission and commission, we have to recognise and focus on one simple fact: We are all in this boat called Jamaica together and we have an overwhelmingly common interest. We must unite against organized crime, whatever our differences. Our differences and criticisms, however acutely felt, pale into insignificance before the challenge of organised crime which we now face. In this fight, we all share one common, single interest: to defeat organise crime.
Therefore, we must subordinate our differences and focus on that overwhelming common interest in which we all share and which unites us all, whether poor or rich or middle class; whether black, white, browning, Chinese, Syrian, Jew or whatever; whether downtown, uptown, crosstown, downtown, inner city, outer city, rural or deep rural, country or town, dreadlocks or baldhead like me here. We all need a Jamaica which is free of organised crime and in which all of our citizens can have a humane and prosperous life for themselves and their children. We must put unity first
We are just at the beginning of our real effort to deal with organised crime. Many, far more severe, challenges lie ahead. We have to gear up for these challenges and not lose our focus and resolve in the face of criticism at this early stage. For there can be little doubt that we haven't seen anything yet in terms of the counter-offensive of organised crime. When the real action comes in the near future and the real giants of criminality in our midst are tackled, they are certain to turn on the heat. Anyone who imagines that Jamaican organized crime with billions of dollars at stake is simply going to roll over and die because of an anti-crime offensive, is living in a dream world.
TOUGH MEASURES
We will be brazenly and forcefully challenged and we shall have to find the will to take tough measures. These will sorely test our personal courage, social unity and resoluteness. Organised criminals understand that playing upon our natural contentiousness, disunity and individualistic attachment to human rights is one of their most effective trump cards.
The criminals are far from being fools and know how to skilfully exploit all the real and imagined resentments which exist in Jamaican society as they do in all societies. They have every intention of manipulating us and playing upon our Robin Hood sentiments. The beauty of this card, from the point of view of organised crime, is that they don't even have to lift a finger. Our quarrelsomeness, social arrogance, resentments and self-doubts are always readily to hand. They effortlessly kick into overdrive automatically.
If we understand this tendency in ourselves to be divisive and to emphasise those things that divide us, we can resist and defeat it. We can emphasise the many positives. It is vital that we do so. It is crucial that, whatever our many differences, we put unity first.
