Calls To Invest At Home Without Guarantees On Crime…

The Caribbean Policy Research Institute (CaPRI) has esti­mat­ed that Jamaica is los­ing US$12.8 bil­lion annu­al­ly in unex­ploit­ed rev­enue from the dias­po­ra, the Jamaica Stock Exchange (JSE) hopes to dou­ble the num­ber of Jamaicans invest­ing on the stock mar­ket by 2019.

“You have a choice as to where you put your mon­ey — Wall Street or Harbour Street.” attor­ney-at-law Marlon Hill told mem­bers of the dias­po­ra who gath­ered at the JSE for a clos­ing bell ring­ing cer­e­mo­ny on Wednesday. The event formed part of the week-long Jamaica 55 Diaspora Conference held at the Jamaica Conference Centre, which focused on issues affect­ing Jamaicans liv­ing over­seas while explor­ing how the pub­lic and pri­vate sec­tor could cre­ate a more effi­cient sys­tem to cap­i­tal­ize on untapped rev­enues from the diaspora.
“If you love GraceKennedy prod­ucts, why not invest in the com­pa­ny? The bread, bis­cuits, logis­tics — all of them are list­ed on the Jamaica Stock Exchange and its only US$100 to open an account with the JSE. (JamaicaObserver)

Isn’t it remark­able just how much Jamaicans at home val­ue the dias­po­ra when the issue of mon­ey comes up?
Don’t get me wrong invest­ing in our home­land is noble, invest­ing for the future a no-brain­er. Where much of the Jamaican com­mu­ni­ty los­es me is in their staunch pos­tur­ing by link­ing the fact that they live on the Island with patriotism.
I mean lis­ten­ing to some of them I some­times have to pinch myself and rehearse my Jamaica accent in the mir­ror, just to con­vince myself that I am still Jamaican.
Never mind my ser­vice to my coun­try or the fact that I took a bul­let in the process.
It appears the sin­gle defin­ing char­ac­ter­is­tic for being a worth­while red-blood­ed gen­uine Jamaican is hav­ing nev­er left or hav­ing left and was uncer­e­mo­ni­ous­ly returned on a one-way flight.

That said, the call to invest in the local stock exchange will not gar­ner the result it should when the coun­try is viewed in the dim cor­rup­tion light in which many Jamaicans abroad view the Island.
The cor­rup­tion and malfea­sance which flows from the top of the stream are cer­tain­ly not lost on any­one, cer­tain­ly not mem­bers of the diaspora.
In fact, it was the cor­rup­tion and lack of oppor­tu­ni­ties which cre­at­ed a dias­po­ra com­mu­ni­ty which is now larg­er than the 2.7 mil­lion peo­ple liv­ing on the Island.

I wish to make it clear that no dias­po­ra group speaks on my behalf and I know a bunch of peo­ple for whom they do not speak either.
Generally, these groups are the same bunch of elit­ist who runs the Island they just don’t live there anymore.
If this gov­ern­ment and busi­ness sec­tor would like to get our mon­ey what it, must do is stop cod­dling criminals.
I speak for myself and a lot of real Jamaicans when we say hell no, we will con­tin­ue to invest in places where we are assured that crim­i­nals will not over­throw the state or that our invest­ments won’t sim­ply disappear.
At the moment we don’t have that assurance.
The Jamaican dias­po­ra has suf­fered immense­ly at the hands of Patriots back home whose sole func­tion is to fig­ure out ways to bilk them of the pro­ceeds of their hard work.
Much the same way the grudge-full­ness and envy are caus­ing the killings on the Island.