Fullsome Declarator Statement On Cockpit Country Needed…

Much has been said on the ques­tion of the Cockpit Country and the need for the Government to stop any min­ing in the pre­cious water­shed.
The Prime Minister, to his cred­it, has shown some sen­si­tiv­i­ty to the issue and in has promised that under his admin­is­tra­tion there will be no min­ing in the cock­pit coun­try.
Additionally, he has met with some activist artiste who has tak­en an inter­est in the cause of pre­serv­ing the area in its pris­tine con­di­tion.
We should all com­mend our artists who use their celebri­ty to bring atten­tion to these press­ing issues of our time.
We should cel­e­brate and encour­age, rather than try to find rea­sons to demo­nize and vil­i­fy them. 

With a clear eye on the evi­dence of the con­se­quences of cli­mate change, and doing what’s right, the Jamaican Government must forth­with can­cel all con­tracts, and make a full declara­to­ry state­ment, that not one sin­gle inch of the Cockpit Country will be touched for min­ing or any­thing else. It mat­ters not at this point, who did what.
The present Administration must now show the abil­i­ty to lead, and not engage in the back and forth about who award­ed con­tracts when.
The Jamaican peo­ple, and the next gen­er­a­tion, deserves a clear and unequiv­o­cal state­ment of lead­er­ship and com­mit­ment from our gov­ern­ment.
That state­ment should end this issue once and for all, that there will be no min­ing in this vital watershed.

This is not a polit­i­cal issue, it is an exis­ten­tial issue. Roughly 40% of the Islands water sup­ply comes from the Cockpit region. Over the years Jamaica has like oth­er coun­tries is record­ing high­er and high­er tem­per­a­tures as the effects of cli­mate change becomes unde­ni­able.
As the Amazon burns, wild­fires in California and Oregon evis­cer­ates entire towns each year, as mam­moth storms wipe out entire Islands, as lands once hab­it­able, become lakes due to ris­ing oceans, the writ­ing is on the wall, and it does not require any­one spe­cial to deci­pher what it is say­ing.
Climate change is real.
If there are finan­cial costs to can­cel­ing Noranda’s con­tracts, the Government should bite the bul­let and can­cel those con­tracts, but there should be no fur­ther action tak­en which would jeop­ar­dizes the future of Jamaica’s children. 

Climate change is hav­ing oth­er effects on our plan­et out­side the obvi­ous lack of water, wild-fires, mas­sive storms, and unpre­dictable tem­per­a­tures.
It is caus­ing mass migra­tion of peo­ple from their homes in search of food and water as the effects many thought would be for oth­er gen­er­a­tions has made it clear, it is for us to fix. For the peo­ple flee­ing their homes in Latin-America, life has become unbear­able with­out water.
This has been hap­pen­ing across the African con­ti­nent for decades, as rich mul­ti-nation­al cor­po­ra­tions con­tin­ue on in its cen­turies-long rape and pil­lage of the con­ti­nent.
Millions in Eritrea, Sudan, Ethiopia, and oth­er African nations have lost their lives and their liveli­hoods but there has hard­ly been any atten­tion paid to this tragedy, because after all, its just Africans dying.

As America strug­gles to deal with the mass of human­i­ty press­ing against its south­ern bor­der, it is impor­tant to under­stand how some of the del­i­ca­cies Americans have come to cher­ish and enjoy, have con­tributed to that mass of human­i­ty at the south­ern bor­der.
In Chile, large scale avo­ca­do farm­ing has divert­ed much-need­ed water from small farms and home­steads leav­ing peas­ant farm­ers and reg­u­lar Chileans with­out the pre­cious com­mod­i­ty, forc­ing them to flee or face death from star­va­tion and thirst.

According to NBC) In one Honduran vil­lage named El Rosario, vil­lagers watched help­less­ly as drought with­ered their corn and bean crops for a fifth straight year. With noth­ing to sell and no food sup­plies to feed their fam­i­lies, they’ve entered the grow­ing sea­son with­out any reserves. 
For those who might want to leave — and can afford to — the choic­es are few. San Pedro Sula, a city a few hours to the north­west, is over­run by drug gangs and vio­lence. Migrant car­a­vans leave from there to the Mexico‑U.S. bor­der but offer no guar­an­tee — and hir­ing a smug­gler costs thou­sands of dol­lars. https://​www​.nbc​news​.com/​n​e​w​s​/​l​a​t​i​n​o​/​c​e​n​t​r​a​l​-​a​m​e​r​i​c​a​-​d​r​y​i​n​g​-​f​a​r​m​e​r​s​-​f​a​c​e​-​c​h​o​i​c​e​-​p​r​a​y​-​r​a​i​n​-​o​r​-​l​e​a​v​e​-​n​1​0​2​7​346

Now is not the time for plat­i­tudes and cheap slo­gans, I applaud the peo­ple who have stood up and demand­ed that the gov­ern­ment lis­ten to their con­cerns. After all, the gov­ern­ment must be a gov­ern­ment of [we the peo­ple]. For once, let us stop label­ing each oth­er with polit­i­cal labels and worse, and instead, see this cri­sis for what it is.
Climate change is not an abstract pro­jec­tion for future gen­er­a­tions to tack­le. It is here today, if we do not tack­le it, there will be no one left to do it.

Please share this arti­cle as much as you can, we need full aware­ness on this issue.

Mike Beckles is a for­mer Jamaican police Detective cor­po­ral, a busi­ness own­er, avid researcher, and blog­ger. 
He is a black achiev­er hon­oree, and pub­lish­er of the blog chatt​-​a​-box​.com. 
He’s also a con­trib­u­tor to sev­er­al web­sites.
You may sub­scribe to his blogs free of charge, or sub­scribe to his Youtube chan­nel @chatt-a-box, for the lat­est pod­cast all free to you of course.