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No peace with guns in town
Tuesday, December 11, 2007
Dear Editor,
There is a sign posted on the roundabout adjacent to the Tony Spaulding Sports Complex in Arnett Gardens, Trench Town. It reads: "Take No Guns To Town". It is a poignantly graphic reminder of the reason for the intolerably high level of lawlessness in Jamaica - the prevalence of illegal guns.
There will never be peace in Jamaica until the majority of illegal guns are confiscated and destroyed, thereby making the 'illegal-gunner' impotent. Please note the term 'illegal-gunner' was used deliberately as opposed to gunman or shotta. We make a grave error when we dignify illegality by adding the suffix 'men' and we also feed their egos by calling them shottas. Good sense should prevail - media, heed the warning, stop elevating criminals! As boys we referred to adult males who behaved unmanly as manure. Maybe a still more appropriate term for them is in fact 'gun-manure'!
As a nation, we are prone to hand-wringing. We are confused and bewildered and we are verbalising this confusion and our apparent hopeless situation. This is ill-advised. It serves no useful purpose and only emboldens our enemy. They are happy when we are sad. They feed off our fear. We should never forget that "we have the handle and they have the blade". They are parasites! They exist because we allow them to. They can be exterminated like termites within a few days or even hours. We need to muster the will to do what is right. Information supplied to the police by their family members, relatives, neighbours, the wider society and even their conscientious cronies is crucial.
Below are two practical steps among the many which must be implemented:
. The traffic branch of the JCF must be sterilised. That is, all corrupt or suspect cops must be weeded out. The culture of accepting and soliciting bribes must come to an unceremonious end! On numerous occasions the police have caught the illegal-gunners in their dragnet but because of a greedy/corrupt cop, or two, they got away. There must be zero tolerance for road traffic violations. Random spot checks must also increase. This strategy will be a temporary inconvenience to law-abiding citizens, but it is better to be late than never.
. Technology, both sophisticated and unsophisticated, must be acquired to find the guns. A simple solution is to train dogs to sniff out gunpowder residue. If it is true that many of the guns are "deportees" (meaning they are used), gunpower residue will be present. We also need to acquire sophisticated technology to search by X-ray or metal detection. The government should also seek assistance from other Caribbean countries and further afield to undertake an islandwide search for illegal guns in every nook and cranny.
There is no need for us to wring our hands. It makes us look pathetic and it serves no useful purpose. It is time to turn the tables; it is time for law-abiding citizens to place lawbreakers under pressure! The "earthly wise" amongst us will no doubt dismiss this proposal as too simplistic. But remember, God uses the "foolish things to confound the wise". Sometimes the solution to our biggest problem is surprisingly simple.
Eradication of lawlessness in our society may be one of those apparently complex problems with a simple solution: the willingness of all to become our brother's keeper.
Carlos R King
carlos.r.king@hotmail.com
Tuesday, December 11, 2007
Dear Editor,
There is a sign posted on the roundabout adjacent to the Tony Spaulding Sports Complex in Arnett Gardens, Trench Town. It reads: "Take No Guns To Town". It is a poignantly graphic reminder of the reason for the intolerably high level of lawlessness in Jamaica - the prevalence of illegal guns.
There will never be peace in Jamaica until the majority of illegal guns are confiscated and destroyed, thereby making the 'illegal-gunner' impotent. Please note the term 'illegal-gunner' was used deliberately as opposed to gunman or shotta. We make a grave error when we dignify illegality by adding the suffix 'men' and we also feed their egos by calling them shottas. Good sense should prevail - media, heed the warning, stop elevating criminals! As boys we referred to adult males who behaved unmanly as manure. Maybe a still more appropriate term for them is in fact 'gun-manure'!
As a nation, we are prone to hand-wringing. We are confused and bewildered and we are verbalising this confusion and our apparent hopeless situation. This is ill-advised. It serves no useful purpose and only emboldens our enemy. They are happy when we are sad. They feed off our fear. We should never forget that "we have the handle and they have the blade". They are parasites! They exist because we allow them to. They can be exterminated like termites within a few days or even hours. We need to muster the will to do what is right. Information supplied to the police by their family members, relatives, neighbours, the wider society and even their conscientious cronies is crucial.
Below are two practical steps among the many which must be implemented:
. The traffic branch of the JCF must be sterilised. That is, all corrupt or suspect cops must be weeded out. The culture of accepting and soliciting bribes must come to an unceremonious end! On numerous occasions the police have caught the illegal-gunners in their dragnet but because of a greedy/corrupt cop, or two, they got away. There must be zero tolerance for road traffic violations. Random spot checks must also increase. This strategy will be a temporary inconvenience to law-abiding citizens, but it is better to be late than never.
. Technology, both sophisticated and unsophisticated, must be acquired to find the guns. A simple solution is to train dogs to sniff out gunpowder residue. If it is true that many of the guns are "deportees" (meaning they are used), gunpower residue will be present. We also need to acquire sophisticated technology to search by X-ray or metal detection. The government should also seek assistance from other Caribbean countries and further afield to undertake an islandwide search for illegal guns in every nook and cranny.
There is no need for us to wring our hands. It makes us look pathetic and it serves no useful purpose. It is time to turn the tables; it is time for law-abiding citizens to place lawbreakers under pressure! The "earthly wise" amongst us will no doubt dismiss this proposal as too simplistic. But remember, God uses the "foolish things to confound the wise". Sometimes the solution to our biggest problem is surprisingly simple.
Eradication of lawlessness in our society may be one of those apparently complex problems with a simple solution: the willingness of all to become our brother's keeper.
Carlos R King
carlos.r.king@hotmail.com