Michael Abrahams | Pothole crosses

Our roads are a disgrace. On my way to work two Fridays ago, I visited three health insurance companies (Guardian, Canopy and Sagicor) in New Kingston before arriving at my practice. I drove on 12 roads between leaving my home and arriving at the office.

And how many of these roads had potholes? All of them, including those in my community and the road on which my office is located. The roads in New Kingston that I drove on were Trafalgar Road, Musgrave Avenue, St Lucia Avenue, Barbados Avenue, Knutsford Boulevard, Grenada Crescent, Antigua Avenue, Dumfries Road and Holborn Road.

Our roads have always been substandard. In my youth, Jamaicans would quip that to drive on our thoroughfares, you must have a PhD (pothole dodger) qualification. But what I have been encountering for the past year is unprecedented. I have been driving for 42 years and have never seen our roads in such a deplorable condition. In the past, whenever I got a flat tyre, it would have been because a nail or some other sharp object punctured it. Nowadays, when I get a flat it is because the tyre has been damaged by a pothole, sometimes beyond repair, or because the rim has been cracked or dented. As for the front end of my vehicle, it has also taken a beating.

I have always driven sedans. Last year, when I went to the dealership I bought my last one from to replace it with a newer version, I was told that the company no longer sells that model because there is more demand for sport utility vehicles (SUVs) due to the state of our roads. When I visited another dealership to buy a sedan similar to the one I had bought from them before the abovementioned car, I was told that the company had stopped selling sedans for the same reason as the previous dealership. Our roads are so bad that some motorists would not even consider purchasing a sedan. So now, for the first time, I am driving an SUV.

MAKE JOKES

We make jokes about our potholes. One of our funniest comedians, the late Elva Ruddock, commented, “Other countries have potholes in their roads, but we have roads in our potholes.” But the state of our roads is no laughing matter. They wreak havoc on our vehicles. I recently made a video based on a poem I wrote titled Pothole Crosses and shared it across several social media platforms. The comments sections under the video and the WhatsApp messages and phone calls I received from people who saw it confirmed that our roads are severely adversely affecting us and costing us a lot of money. There was a deluge of comments from people telling me about having to buy tyres and fix rims and spend a fortune on front-end parts and repairs.

Last December, Prime Minister Andrew Holness declared Jamaica’s road situation a national emergency, allocated $2 billion to effect repairs, and announced the Shared Prosperity through Accelerated Improvement in our Road Network (SPARK) Programme, with a budget of over $45 billion. Some $3 billion had already been allocated under the REACH programme announced after Hurricane Beryl impacted the island on July 3, 2024. I commend our prime minister for recognising the crisis and announcing these interventions.

However, I find his refusal to take responsibility for any of what is happening now to be disturbing. He said the deplorable state of our roads is not a result of neglect by his administration, but other factors, including previous administrations and climate change. Those claims are both ridiculous and disingenuous. The fact is that both previous administrations and Holness’ administration are responsible for the mess we are in now.

While the People’s National Party (PNP) Opposition calls out Holness for his administration’s negligence of our roads, they must also acknowledge their role. It was their Minister of Transport and Works Robert Pickersgill who promised that we would be “pothole-free in 2003”, and failed to keep his promise. When Jamaican singer Tessanne Chin won a vehicle on the singing contest The Voice and laughingly remarked that “we have the worst roads” in 2013, the PNP’s Portia Simpson Miller was our prime minister. The Opposition berated Holness for repealing the Road Maintenance Fund Act they instituted in 2002 after his administration repealed it in 2017. But while the act existed, our road infrastructure was still lacking.

ROADS HAVE DETERIORATED

Andrew Holness has been our prime minister for the past nine years, and under his watch, our roads have deteriorated to the most deplorable condition many of us have ever seen. How can he not take at least some responsibility? We experienced more rainfall than usual during the latter part of last year, but that is no excuse for the multiplicity of craters that persist on our thoroughfares.

The PNP and Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) governments have taken turns short-changing us with respect to our roadways. Shoddy workmanship using substandard materials that result in poorly constructed roads with inadequate drainage, in addition to poor maintenance, plus corruption, with contracts being given to suboptimally qualified friends and associates, along with kickbacks, have resulted in major inconveniences for our populace. The inferior road construction has not only cost us financially, but some have paid with their lives, as potholes and other road defects have caused fatal accidents.

The SPARK Programme is under way, and I hope it does make a difference. However, our political leaders on both sides of the aisle must commit to doing what is in the country’s best interest and not what is beneficial to themselves and their cronies. Instead of patching and repairing roads as local government and general elections approach, they need to invest in the best and most qualified personnel, equipment and materials and pay attention to the maintenance of our thoroughfares. There is no reason why we cannot have good roads.

Check out the video of my poem Pothole Crosses here: https://youtu.be/UkmbmiWa5us?si=K-73reRJcj0xJ3xB.

Michael Abrahams is an obstetrician and gynaecologist, social commentator, and human-rights advocate. Send feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com and michabe_1999@hotmail.com, or follow him on X , formerly Twitter, @mikeyabrahams.