The Editor, Sir:

I find on the mark a recent editorial in another newspaper encouraging the current govern-ment to push forward the police recruitment drive that gained momentum under Peter Phillips' tenure as Minister of National Security under the previous government.

I would take it a step farther, however, and suggest that the recruitment drive - if it is not already the case - be taken right into the major source of crime and criminal elements in Jamaica - the garrisons!

Isn't it mostly the youths in the garrisons - growing up in an environment characterised by poverty, bad parenting, bad role models, no morals, no respect for life, no regard for the younger generation and an affinity for destructive music and habits - who are now wreaking havoc all over the island?

Fighting fire with fire

So, I say to the police, go in there, take them and train them to be police. That is another method of fighting fire with fire and it might just be more effective!

Instead of the tit-for-tat exchange of gunfire and lives between the criminals and police, let us take the lives of the criminals another way.

It serves to both reduce the fertility of the source that breeds the most infamous criminals in Jamaica, and, at the same time, increases the numbers on the police force to more effectively battle the seasoned criminals that they could not get to in time.

On another note, I find rather refreshing the rare acknowledgment of that media outlet that the former government, indeed, was not all termites and intellectual depravity.

It is sad that in the editorial that media outlet could not find a place to mention the current security minister in any current initiatives.

The current Prime Minister Bruce Golding placed his confidence in him as security minister and has placed crime on the top of the government's priorities list.

With that and the current state of affairs of crime in Jamaica, I find Derrick Smith's silence rather unnerving.

I am, etc.,

'SENSIBLE JAMAICAN'

sensiblejamaican@googlemail.com