Delroy Chuck
NORMALLY, THE start of a new year brings renewed hope, a fresh start and inspiration for a better life. For most, greetings of 'Happy New Year' and wishes of peace, prosperity and progress were stifled and smothered by the sadness and unhappy events of 2005. The year 2005 was not a good year, nothing seems to have gone right and the year ended as it started - with increasing murders and escalating crimes overwhelming the nation.
We can continue to bury our heads in the sand and believe that things are going right and, don't worry, everything will be alright - even when the evidence suggests otherwise. Yet unless we face up to the compelling signals and confront the nation's problems head on, there will be no solutions and, as a people, we will just continue to drift, decline and sink. When the figures are finally tallied, murders are likely to be close to 1,680, or about 200 more than 2004. Figures for other crimes are unreliable, as most victims can't be bothered to waste time and effort reporting them to the police. If a true victim survey were done, the criminal statistics would be frightening.
MOST SERIOUS CHALLENGE
Crime and the fear of crime pose the most serious challenge for 2006. Criminal attacks, violent deaths and daring robberies have overshadowed virtually every community. Unless we can tame the growing monster of criminality, Jamaica can only sink deeper into the dark abyss of increasing frustration, crippling hardships and a failed state. Yet, it will not come overnight. There is no magic solution to crime. Those who offer an immediate solution are merely offering greater tyranny, frightening injustice and the usual unquestioned brutalities that tend to aggravate instead of mitigate the problem.
In these columns, and elsewhere, I have argued that increasing crime, as reflected in the murder figures, is a symptom of a society in distress, disintegration and disarray. We can never curb criminality and bring lasting peace, when so many other sectors of our national life are in decline. In truth, crime is a measure of social degeneration, of the erosion of moral values, of rampant indiscipline, of economic deprivation and inequities, of obvious human failures and of the collapse of social and state institutions. If we are to stop the deterioration, the nation will need a new wave of fresh thinking that puts Jamaica first and before partisan and selfish interests and, perhaps for the first time, starts to see every Jamaican as a worthy human being entitled to be treated with dignity, respect and humane consideration.
'WE AND THEM'
For too long, Jamaicans have been divided into the 'we and them' mentality that is tearing us even further and further apart. We measure one another by the feeble and demeaning consideration of our personal, partisan and material status in life. The effect is that people from the ghetto, the poor, the underclass and the easily forgotten, are not worthy of due and favourable assessment, whether it is in our courts of law, on the roads or even for government services. When people are treated with such disdain and disregard, they find ways and means to overcome the injustice and disrespect, and corruption and criminality offer alternative routes for peer power, status and reputation.
The wailing cries of people from the inner cities and rural areas are for respect and justice, and for the opportunities to make their lives better. But, they are given periodic handouts, vain promises and powerful doses of public relations to socially engineer their minds to believe that things are okay and, thus, to accept their status in life.
Jamaica can do better and must do better in 2006. The real challenge is to empower and instil in Jamaicans the meaning of true human worth and that they are more than just numbers and non-entities in a country in which they just happen to reside. If and when our leaders, government agencies and institutions of law and justice start to accord respect, decorum and inclusiveness to every Jamaican, regardless of their status or record, Jamaica and Jamaicans could start to turn the corner towards a better future and that must be our challenge for 2006.
Delroy Chuck is an attorney-at-law and member of
parliament. He can be contacted by email at delchuck@hotmail.com.
