The JDF Is Now A Police Force In A Different Uniform, Bye-bye Luster & Shine…

Policing is not exact­ly an easy job; the lev­el of sup­port that police offi­cers receive in exe­cut­ing their duties may be dic­tat­ed by the lev­el of matu­ri­ty and suf­fi­cien­cy of the com­mu­ni­ties they police. Poorer, dis­ad­van­taged com­mu­ni­ties that are incu­ba­tors of crim­i­nal­i­ty tend to be less tol­er­ant of gov­ern­ment agents (police), whom they view less favor­ably as oppres­sors than protectors.
This is not a con­cept con­fined to Jamaica but rather one that per­me­ates poor­er soci­eties in which the police is the face and force of Government.
As a for­mer police offi­cer who spent a decade polic­ing the grit­ty com­mu­ni­ties of Kingston & Saint Andrew and many places across Jamaica, I under­stood ful­ly the psy­chol­o­gy that binds com­mu­ni­ties that view gov­ern­ment in an unfa­vor­able light, regard­less of who is in power.

Poverty, lack of oppor­tu­ni­ties, and lack of resources in those com­mu­ni­ties become soil, water, and sun­light for the ger­mi­na­tion and growth of crime.
Government agents are the least wel­come vis­i­tors to those com­mu­ni­ties; gov­ern­ment agents are seen as ‘stop­ping their food.’(sic)
Regardless of the right­ness of police action with­in those com­mu­ni­ties, there is lit­tle sup­port for what they do; law­ful police action is viewed as ‘evil by the wicked police.’
So arrest­ing some­one who has been steal­ing elec­tric­i­ty, water, or food is a crime by the wicked police, not the right thing to do as they are tasked.
Anti-police hatred should be anti-gov­ern­ment hatred, but as I said ear­li­er since the police are the face and force of gov­ern­ment, that ven­om is direct­ed at them. In Jamaica, in par­tic­u­lar, that ven­om is spread by a lazy and decep­tive media that know­ing­ly par­tic­i­pates in dis­sem­i­nat­ing false information.
Of the two main secu­ri­ty agen­cies, the JCF & JDF, the Jamaica Defence Force has long enjoyed def­er­ence and respect from inner-city com­mu­ni­ties that the police as an agency could only hope for. Individual police offi­cers who exem­pli­fied them­selves in dif­fer­ent ways enjoyed sup­port and respect, not the force as a collective.
The JDF was more revered and respect­ed because (a) many rank-and-file mil­i­tary mem­bers lived in those com­mu­ni­ties, but (b) more so because sol­diers were not tasked with doing police duties. They were only called out for spe­cial events.
Over the last sev­er­al decades, the JDF has been pressed more and more into com­pli­ment­ing police num­bers in law enforce­ment duties. As com­mu­ni­ties real­ize that polic­ing is a con­cept, not a per­son or group of peo­ple, the lus­ter has grad­u­al­ly worn off the JDF. Soldiers are essen­tial­ly now police in a dif­fer­ent uniform.

The young men and women of the JDF who are thrust into these unten­able sit­u­a­tions live the night­mare that young men and women of the JCF have been exposed to for decades after independence.
They have expe­ri­enced the anger from com­mu­ni­ties pissed at gov­ern­ment fail­ures, incom­pe­tence, cor­rup­tion, and bad policies.
Young mem­bers of the secu­ri­ty forces are vic­tims of the sys­tems like the peo­ple who live in those communities.
Members of the Jamaica Defense Force are now liv­ing the night­mare their coun­ter­parts in the Constabulary have always lived, deal­ing with oblig­a­tory accu­sa­tions they are mur­der­ers and the lies that every­one wit­nessed events of police abuse that occurred at four in the morn­ing. An irre­spon­si­ble and lazy press enhances the process of spread­ing the poison.
Young sol­diers in west Kingston and wher­ev­er else their polit­i­cal boss­es thrust them into cov­er­ing up the smoke of polit­i­cal incom­pe­tence must now nav­i­gate paths to their sur­vival, which is to col­lect their pay­check and go home to their fam­i­lies. The same dilem­ma young police offi­cers face that leads to the high attri­tion the Constabulary faces, despite the lack of jobs in the country.
The JDF is now a police force in a dif­fer­ent uni­form, bye-bye luster.…..

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Mike Beckles is a for­mer Police Detective, busi­ness­man, a free­lance writer, black achiev­er hon­oree, and cre­ator of the blog mike​beck​les​.com.