Today’s Elections A Referendum On Both Parties.….….…..

Today Jamaicans get to chose rep­re­sen­ta­tives to han­dle their busi­ness at the local level.
Frankly I nev­er quite under­stood the need for parish Councillors , what with the size of the country.
The coun­try is small enough that mem­bers of par­lia­ment should have no rea­son not to be total­ly in touch with the peo­ple . A coun­try of 4411 square miles and a 63 mem­ber leg­is­la­ture why does the coun­try need all of these paid positions?
Anyway !!!

These local Government elec­tions are a ref­er­en­dum of sorts on both the PNP and the rul­ing JLP.
The Labor par­ty which now forms the gov­ern­ment has fol­lowed through on some of it’s cam­paign promis­es since tak­ing office. The econ­o­my seem to be on the right course accord­ing to the Island’s pri­ma­ry lender, the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
The econ­o­my is also expe­ri­enc­ing a slight uptick in eco­nom­ic growth over the ane­mic growth-rate which has char­ac­ter­ized the PNP’s tenure at the helm.
Additionally the PNP is still stuck in post elec­tion shock, unable to grasp that the peo­ple have deliv­ered a com­pre­hen­sive repu­di­a­tion of their stew­ard­ship despite the slen­der JLP major­i­ty in the Legislature. It is no easy feat to pick up eleven seats with­out los­ing a sin­gle one giv­en the Islands hor­ri­ble gar­ri­son cul­ture which is dom­i­nat­ed by the PNP.
Since tak­ing office how­ev­er the JLP has done noth­ing out­side pay­ing lip ser­vice to crime. As a result mur­ders and oth­er seri­ous crimes have con­tin­ued to increase on it’s watch. In one week 55 Jamaicans were report­ed killed, as egre­gious as those num­bers are there is lit­tle rea­son to believe that the num­ber may not actu­al­ly be high­er as some mur­ders are not report­ed to authorities.
In this medi­um we have con­sis­tent­ly argued that at a bare min­i­mum crime dras­ti­cal­ly reduces stan­dards of liv­ing and worse case traps the major­i­ty in a vis­cous cycle of mor­tal poverty.
https://​mike​beck​les​.com/​2​3​6​864 – 2/

ANY ECONOMIC RECOVERY MUST BEGIN WITH SUFFOCATING THE CRIME MONSTER…

I have been sound­ing the alarm to both polit­i­cal par­ties for years, mak­ing the case that there can be no real pros­per­i­ty or true eco­nom­ic gain unless the crime mon­ster is suffocated.
I wrote about this before the new JLP Administration took office, hop­ing to head off a sense of lethar­gy on the issue.
Since tak­ing office the JLP has con­tin­ued on it’s mer­ry way , con­duct­ing busi­ness as if the threat crime pos­es is a fig­ment of our imag­i­na­tion and not the exis­ten­tial threat that it is.
At least until now.
We now hear the Minister of National Security telling the Nation that quote “there can be no social and eco­nom­ic growth in Jamaica with­out a reduc­tion in crime”.
What a nov­el con­cept. Wonder where that idea came from?
To begin with, despite hav­ing said he turned down the National Security Portfolio offer Montague’s selec­tion demon­strat­ed that Holness and the hier­ar­chy of the JLP sim­ply intend­ed to punt the ball up the field and put it’s defen­sive team on the field.
https://​mike​beck​les​.com/​m​o​n​t​a​g​u​e​s​-​a​p​p​o​i​n​t​m​e​n​t​-​s​a​y​-​a​d​m​i​n​i​s​t​r​a​t​i​o​n​s​-​s​e​r​i​o​u​s​n​e​s​s​-​c​r​i​me/

WHAT DOES MONTAGUE’S APPOINTMENT SAY ABOUT ADMINISTRATION’S SERIOUSNESS ABOUT CRIME….

This writer did no more believe that a botanist was going to pos­sess the req­ui­site skills and knowl­edge to make the impor­tant deci­sions on crime than a fire­man would be able to per­form brain surgery.
Nevertheless both his appoint­ment and his ini­tial refusal did offer a win­dow into the thought process of Holness and the JLP.
They fun­da­men­tal­ly do not under­stand the seri­ous con­se­quences crime have on soci­ety. As such they want­ed to main­tain a stale­mate of sorts on crime , not ruf­fle any feath­ers but get what they pri­or­i­tize done.
What the JLP is dis­cov­er­ing now is that things do not work that way.
It’s iron­ic that Holness’ age and where he was edu­cat­ed has shaped his under­stand­ing of crime , more so than the polit­i­cal par­ty he leads does.
The JLP was the par­ty of Hugh Lawson Shearer, the take no pris­on­ers on crime Prime Minister, who under­stood more than any oth­er per­son to enter pol­i­tics on the Island that crime can­not be tolerated.
Andrew Holness a prod­uct of his time and a grad­u­ate of the UWI sim­ply lack the fun­da­men­tal under­stand­ing he needs to have.
Its a sil­ly and igno­rant posi­tion tak­en by the Island’s so-called edu­cat­ed, that the nation can sim­ply go on pre­tend­ing that crime has no impact.
Andrew Holness is as a much a vic­tim of that mis­tak­en lib­er­al brain­wash­ing as any other.
Whether he is afraid of the inevitable con­dem­na­tion deci­sive action will bring or he is ter­ri­fied of los­ing the next General elec­tion is any­one’s guess.
What is evi­dent is that pay­ing lip ser­vice to Fidel Castro a tow­er­ing fig­ure on order and the deliv­ery of ser­vice , while cow­er­ing in a cor­ner away from the killings will not improve the lot of our country.

It is expect­ed that the PNP will do noth­ing on crime, the par­ty thrives on crime , chaos and corruption.
Without gar­risons and crim­i­nal gangs the PNP is irrel­e­vant. The brazen threats issued by that par­ty’s leader in St Ann recent­ly against her own sup­port­ers is indeed quid pro quo that the PNP is a par­ty of crim­i­nals , for crim­i­nals, with no inten­tion of changing.
The PNP needs the crim­i­nal gangs to main­tain it’s pow­er-base, in return it gives them cover.
The JLP must gath­er the courage to move the Island away from this vis­cous cycle.