Editorial | Now that the PM is liberated

It should have been always that way – that Prime Minister Andrew Holness feels unconstrained to do what is right and best for Jamaica. That is his job and obligation.

But now that the prime minister feels unfettered by narrow political ambition, and not caring whether he wins another election, we rejoice with him at his sense of liberation. It is not often that politicians arrive at this place.

Perhaps Mr Holness will now go for broke, expending political capital in tackling the big constraints to Jamaica's development among the most important of which is overhauling a law-enforcement apparatus that relatively few Jamaicans trust and political and state bureaucracy that large swathes of the country consider being corrupt.

That Mr Holness has pushed back at the critics of his government's decision to bulldoze partially built homes on 'captured' government lands near Clifton, St Catherine, is not surprising. Indeed, the prime minister argued that a criminal gang was purporting to sell the land, which could not be allowed to stand.

The framework within which he fitted his motivation to act, without concerns for political consequences, however, is especially notable. He has already been prime minister three times, Mr Holness said in a speech at a function where homes financed by the National Housing Trust were distributed to contributors. So he was past the stage where he was driven to win political popularity or favour.

Said Mr Holness: “It doesn't matter to me anymore. I have to start to think about legacy. What will Jamaica be? Will it be the same as I came and saw it? I can't let it be the way I came and saw it.”

FILLED WITH EMOTION

The prime minister was obviously filled with emotion as he posed these rhetorical questions. His voice quavered. Tears, it seems, built up. He paused before completing the last sentence If Mr Holness is ready for the large, transformational things, this newspaper stands with him once he acts judiciously, with fairness, respectful of natural justice and within the rule of law, and his causes as demonstrably in the best interest of Jamaica.

The prime minister's immediate focus, however, was on Jamaica's problem of squatting and unplanned developments (in which an estimated one-third of the population lives) and the authorities' failure to consistently enforce regulations because of their fear of the potential political fallout. Yet, this action compromises the Government's ability to orderly plan developments and the delivery of services to the communities and undermines the rule of law.

“It is not an easy task to communicate this because there are vested interests who want to turn this into a political issue for their political benefit,” Mr Holness said of the Clifton situation. “There must never be any political compromise about the rule of law. For decades, we have been winking and [have] been duplicitous and equivocal about the enforcement of the rule of law.”

The prime minister is right. But this failure, across the political administrations, transcends the issue of squatting, which clearly demands focused attention, starting with a rational and transparent policy for the divestment of state-owned lands that gives ordinary folk an equal shot at traversing the labyrinth of land purchase, registration, and titling.

DEEPER PROBLEMS

Jamaica's rule-of-law problems are deeper than squatting and the informal communities that flow from them. Even problematic is the absence, or low levels, of trust in the island's law-enforcement and state institutions. Indeed, surveys consistently indicate that no more than 10 per cent of the population has high levels of trust in the police, and around a fifth have no trust at all. The overarching perception of the police of more than half the population is negative. The police force is seen not only as corrupt, but impervious to slow, piecemeal reforms. It demands radical overhaul, many experts agree.

More generally, around seven in 10 Jamaicans believe that they live in a corrupt country, while the 2021 survey by Vanderbilt University's research laboratory in attitudes towards democracy in the Americas found that 55 per cent of Jamaicans believe that most politicians are corrupt. Other surveys have revealed similar negative perceptions of Parliament, the courts, and other institutions.

It is quite possible that these perceptions overstate Jamaica's reality. Citizens, however, did not arrive at them merely because of their unfounded, contrived, or conjured ill will towards politicians or institutions of the State. They develop them because of the behaviours and attitudes of public officials with whom they interact.

Given his new unencumbered ability to act, Mr Holness is in a good place to begin to tackle these matters without the shackles or the limitations of narrow political ambition. Although doing what is right would of itself be profoundly legacy-building.

With respect to police reform, we look forward to action beyond box-ticking the delivery of new technologies or the purchase of more vehicles. These, obviously, are important to improving efficiency, but they won't be transformational without a fundamental shift of culture – that is, the people and hard accountability aspects of change, which have not been at the forefront of reform. Similarly, it is expected that Mr Holness' intolerance of corruption will manifest itself in ways beyond support for institutions, but in an aggressive, leadership-from-the-front rooting out of misbehavers.

Put another way, if it were the case that the prime minister, in the past, needed others – say, the Opposition – with whom to share the risk of undertaking the politically most difficult actions, his new circumstance has removed that constraint. With no one sharing the risks, he won't have to share the rewards. And his legacy.