Reject Criminality

MINISTER of National Security Peter Bunting says Jamaicans must reject scam­ming, crim­i­nal­i­ty, extor­tion and gang vio­lence at the famil­ial and com­mu­ni­ty lev­els, or the efforts of the police will come to nought.

The min­is­ter was speak­ing at a ral­ly fol­low­ing the 10,000 Men and their Families March for Peace at Dump-up Beach, Montego Bay, last Sunday.

Bunting said he was opti­mistic that the march sig­nalled a high­er lev­el of pub­lic involve­ment in the fight against crime.

“I am hope­ful because the thou­sands of per­sons out here today can make a greater dif­fer­ence than anoth­er 200 police or anoth­er 500 police. The lead­er­ship pro­vid­ed by the Ministers’ Fraternal in St James is a start and it is going to con­tin­ue tomor­row, the next day, the next week, the next month, next year until we win the bat­tle against crime and vio­lence in St James,” the min­is­ter said.

He renewed his pledge to take back St James from the hands of crim­i­nal ele­ments; how­ev­er, he cit­ed the role of fam­i­lies and com­mu­ni­ties in the fight.

“If you say Jesus, say Jesus or if you say scam­mer, then you say scam­mer, because the Bible teach­es us ‘You can’t serve two mas­ters. You can­not serve God and mam­mon, and mam­mon is what you (are) get­ting from the scam­ming. If you sow the wind, you will reap the whirl­wind,” Bunting warned.

The Montego Bay march was organ­ised by the St James Ministers’ Fraternal, in col­lab­o­ra­tion with the Citizen Security and Justice Programme, National Integrity Action, Child Development Agency, Office of the Children’s Advocate, Jamaica Constabulary Force, Social Development Commission, and the St James Parish Council.

The main objec­tives were: re-empha­sis­ing the impor­tance of Biblical prin­ci­ples and val­ues in the process of com­mu­ni­ty and nation­al devel­op­ment; and mobil­is­ing men and their fam­i­lies to par­tic­i­pate in a march to raise their con­scious­ness of their role and place in the fight against crime and violence.

According to the St James Ministers’ Fraternal, the inten­tion of the march was also to facil­i­tate pos­i­tive change in the com­mu­ni­ties of St James and its envi­rons, reflect­ed in fam­i­ly life and pater­nal respon­si­bil­i­ties, pos­i­tive male role mod­els and affir­ma­tion of the val­ue of male­ness as well as to recog­nise and cel­e­brate the con­tri­bu­tion being made by respon­si­ble men to com­mu­ni­ty and nation build­ing; and to facil­i­tate the com­ing togeth­er of all stake­hold­ers as a sig­nalled pledge to approach crime fight­ing and vio­lence pre­ven­tion from a com­mu­nal perspective.

Also call­ing for fam­i­lies and com­mu­ni­ties to lead the fight, main speak­er, Archbishop of Kingston Rev Charles Dufour, addressed cyn­ics and crit­ics of the march.

“Their cyn­i­cism does not change the pow­er of the sym­bol of a march. …We are declar­ing that some­thing is trou­bling us very deeply, we are declar­ing that some­thing mat­ters enough to us to take us out of our homes, off our veran­dahs, out of our church build­ings, out of our bars and into the streets. Something very, very pre­cious is at stake and we are not about to sit and watch it tak­en from us,” the Archbishop said.

“Throughout his­to­ry, peace­ful march­es have irre­versibly dis­turbed the sta­tus quo, they have top­pled regimes; and they have won strug­gles for lib­er­a­tion. A march is a sym­bol of a com­mu­ni­ty’s resolve, its deter­mi­na­tion to act, its refusal to be held pris­on­er by any force. It means that the peo­ple are not just awake, they are roused,” he added. sto­ry orig­i­nat­ed here: Call made for Jamaicans to reject criminality