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Fiddling while Rome burns
published: Sunday | December 16, 2007
File
Policemen process the crime scene where five persons were shot and killed by gunmen just outside of Lionel Town in the early hours of December 4.
Don Robotham, Contributor
We face enormous economic and social problems in Jamaica. There is the ever-spiralling murder rate. There is the crisis of our youth. There is the horrendous price increases. There is the crisis in educational quality relating to English and math. There is the near collapse of our road system due to the recent floods. There is the problem of debt and macroeconomic stability. Enough to full the plate of any government to overflowing.
But instead of addressing the real problems of the country, the Government has provoked a completely unnecessary constitutional wrangle which is now threatening to embroil the office of the Governor-General. This is an amazing situation and a huge disappointment for those who thought that the Golding government's early statements about a new style of governance were to be taken seriously. This government is fiddling while Rome burns.
Look at what Dr. Ralph Thompson pointed out about our educational failures in English and math at the high-school level in The Gleaner of last Friday. Eighty-nine per cent of students in non-traditional high schools failed English at CSEC. Ninety-six per cent failed mathematics. In technical schools, 81 per cent failed English and an amazing 96 per cent failed math. What sort of technical schools are these in which the students cannot pass mathematics - the intellectual foundation of all technical knowledge?
The situation is not much better in our traditional high schools. There 'only' 39 per cent failed English, as many as 59 per cent failed math. If this is not a crisis, what is? Instead of addressing this issue head on, the Government has led the country into foolish and unnecessary legal wrangles. What sort of nonsense is this?
Dr. Thompson pointed out in his analysis that "total school enrolment for English language was 40,037, but 17,612 students were not allowed to sit the examination. Of the 22,425 who sat the examination, 10,789 failed." In other words, the real truth is that 71 per cent of our young people who are in the relevant enrolment cohort attend high school but exit as they entered: sans English.
This may even be an underestimate as the passing grade may actually have been lowered to include Grade III as a pass. It would be interesting to know what is the definition of 'pass' nowadays and in these data. It would also be useful to have some analysis by gender - how are our teenage boys doing, or are we afraid to ask?
Youth crisis?
We should realise at this point that all this feeds into our youth crisis and our spiralling murder rate. One of the clear characteristics of young criminals confirmed over and over again is that they have some high-school education but no certification. The education is enough to raise their expectations but not enough to fulfill them in the labour market. Our murder rate continues to spiral. Edward Seaga and others have made useful proposals to add an extra hour of work in the high-school system. I have suggested various approaches to post-secondary English education for employed youth. All of these have been ignored by the Golding government. They can find time to bring the reputation of outstanding Jamaicans into disrepute with all manner of allegations, but they cannot find time to address the crisis in educational quality!
Stunned
When I saw the photographs of the group of distinguished Jamaicans who were being unceremoniously run off the Public Service Commission, I was stunned. Are these the persons who the Golding government wishes us to believe acted 'improperly' with all kinds of ulterior motives?
This is utterly scandalous! These persons enjoy a much, much higher reputation than any Jamaican politician. They have varying political allegiances as far as I know, but are all known to be persons of the highest integrity who have served the country well in a variety of capacities. To have their name dragged through the mud is completely unacceptable.
The appointment of a Solicitor General is hardly an earth-shaking matter. It is the Government who, by its clumsy intransigence, has created this crisis. Now, the Governor-General's office has got involved and could also be discredited by this sad episode.
On Wednesday, December 12, a release from the Governor-General's secretary, in commenting on earlier press reports, said no letters of dismissal had been issued to members of the PSC. At the said moment, letters of dismissal were apparently being distributed!
Are we to believe that the Governor- General's secretary has found himself in the same position as that famous anonymous employee of a well-known firm who is alleged to have installed electricity-stealing equipment on JPS lines without authorisation? Is this another case of acting 'without authorisation'?
The murder rate is now over 1,500 for the year. Suggestions have been made to adapt the British system of preventive detention to Jamaican conditions. Not a word from the Government. It pretends as if preventive detention is a PNP invention. Well, let me remind you in case you have forgotten, the very first state of emergency in independent Jamaica was not the one by Michael Manley in the 1970s.
The first state of emergency in independent Jamaica was instituted by the JLP when Donald Sangster was acting Prime Minister in September 1966.
Look at what is happening with price increases. Barbados has capped some price increases. Peter Bunting attempted to propose a similar set of measures in Parliament recently. The Government boxed it aside with the claim that this was a market economy. Well, what is Barbados - a state socialist economy? What sort of ignorant neo-liberal rubbish is this?
I never took the National Democratic Movement (NDM) rubbish seriously. I applauded when the country dismissed them at the ballot box. I rejected their pompous and vacuous legalism as an empty vessel. Likewise, for many of our new human rights groups, a representative of which had the gall to defend the Government's actions on the Vasciannie affair.
These groups are simply anti-PNP vessels, hiding their defence of social, racial and economic privilege behind a curtain of condescending crocodile tears, blah blah blah about human rights. How they love the poor! When their own narrow interests are at stake however, they sing a different tune. Posturers! They are more tribal than the tribe. They rush to point out what A. J. Nicholson said about Kern Spencer or what Michael Manley did about the PSC in his time, all of which criticisms are true.
But notice how these distinguished legal and media luminaries of the JLP deploy this argument. They hark back to the past not to condemn what is going on in the present, but in order to defend it! If Nicholson could do it, some ask, why fuss about Montague? Do they not see how tribal such an argument is?
This is the logic of the feud, passing down tribal hatreds from generation to generation. Upper and middle-class tribalism is the worst kind. At least working-class people don't pretend and try to cover their tribal loyalties with all manner of loathsome legalistic rationalisations. I thought that Mr. Golding's lofty words at his swearing-in meant that the new government sought to take a fresh new course. I believed this, but apparently I was wrong.
published: Sunday | December 16, 2007
File
Policemen process the crime scene where five persons were shot and killed by gunmen just outside of Lionel Town in the early hours of December 4.
Don Robotham, Contributor
We face enormous economic and social problems in Jamaica. There is the ever-spiralling murder rate. There is the crisis of our youth. There is the horrendous price increases. There is the crisis in educational quality relating to English and math. There is the near collapse of our road system due to the recent floods. There is the problem of debt and macroeconomic stability. Enough to full the plate of any government to overflowing.
But instead of addressing the real problems of the country, the Government has provoked a completely unnecessary constitutional wrangle which is now threatening to embroil the office of the Governor-General. This is an amazing situation and a huge disappointment for those who thought that the Golding government's early statements about a new style of governance were to be taken seriously. This government is fiddling while Rome burns.
Look at what Dr. Ralph Thompson pointed out about our educational failures in English and math at the high-school level in The Gleaner of last Friday. Eighty-nine per cent of students in non-traditional high schools failed English at CSEC. Ninety-six per cent failed mathematics. In technical schools, 81 per cent failed English and an amazing 96 per cent failed math. What sort of technical schools are these in which the students cannot pass mathematics - the intellectual foundation of all technical knowledge?
The situation is not much better in our traditional high schools. There 'only' 39 per cent failed English, as many as 59 per cent failed math. If this is not a crisis, what is? Instead of addressing this issue head on, the Government has led the country into foolish and unnecessary legal wrangles. What sort of nonsense is this?
Dr. Thompson pointed out in his analysis that "total school enrolment for English language was 40,037, but 17,612 students were not allowed to sit the examination. Of the 22,425 who sat the examination, 10,789 failed." In other words, the real truth is that 71 per cent of our young people who are in the relevant enrolment cohort attend high school but exit as they entered: sans English.
This may even be an underestimate as the passing grade may actually have been lowered to include Grade III as a pass. It would be interesting to know what is the definition of 'pass' nowadays and in these data. It would also be useful to have some analysis by gender - how are our teenage boys doing, or are we afraid to ask?
Youth crisis?
We should realise at this point that all this feeds into our youth crisis and our spiralling murder rate. One of the clear characteristics of young criminals confirmed over and over again is that they have some high-school education but no certification. The education is enough to raise their expectations but not enough to fulfill them in the labour market. Our murder rate continues to spiral. Edward Seaga and others have made useful proposals to add an extra hour of work in the high-school system. I have suggested various approaches to post-secondary English education for employed youth. All of these have been ignored by the Golding government. They can find time to bring the reputation of outstanding Jamaicans into disrepute with all manner of allegations, but they cannot find time to address the crisis in educational quality!
Stunned
When I saw the photographs of the group of distinguished Jamaicans who were being unceremoniously run off the Public Service Commission, I was stunned. Are these the persons who the Golding government wishes us to believe acted 'improperly' with all kinds of ulterior motives?
This is utterly scandalous! These persons enjoy a much, much higher reputation than any Jamaican politician. They have varying political allegiances as far as I know, but are all known to be persons of the highest integrity who have served the country well in a variety of capacities. To have their name dragged through the mud is completely unacceptable.
The appointment of a Solicitor General is hardly an earth-shaking matter. It is the Government who, by its clumsy intransigence, has created this crisis. Now, the Governor-General's office has got involved and could also be discredited by this sad episode.
On Wednesday, December 12, a release from the Governor-General's secretary, in commenting on earlier press reports, said no letters of dismissal had been issued to members of the PSC. At the said moment, letters of dismissal were apparently being distributed!
Are we to believe that the Governor- General's secretary has found himself in the same position as that famous anonymous employee of a well-known firm who is alleged to have installed electricity-stealing equipment on JPS lines without authorisation? Is this another case of acting 'without authorisation'?
The murder rate is now over 1,500 for the year. Suggestions have been made to adapt the British system of preventive detention to Jamaican conditions. Not a word from the Government. It pretends as if preventive detention is a PNP invention. Well, let me remind you in case you have forgotten, the very first state of emergency in independent Jamaica was not the one by Michael Manley in the 1970s.
The first state of emergency in independent Jamaica was instituted by the JLP when Donald Sangster was acting Prime Minister in September 1966.
Look at what is happening with price increases. Barbados has capped some price increases. Peter Bunting attempted to propose a similar set of measures in Parliament recently. The Government boxed it aside with the claim that this was a market economy. Well, what is Barbados - a state socialist economy? What sort of ignorant neo-liberal rubbish is this?
I never took the National Democratic Movement (NDM) rubbish seriously. I applauded when the country dismissed them at the ballot box. I rejected their pompous and vacuous legalism as an empty vessel. Likewise, for many of our new human rights groups, a representative of which had the gall to defend the Government's actions on the Vasciannie affair.
These groups are simply anti-PNP vessels, hiding their defence of social, racial and economic privilege behind a curtain of condescending crocodile tears, blah blah blah about human rights. How they love the poor! When their own narrow interests are at stake however, they sing a different tune. Posturers! They are more tribal than the tribe. They rush to point out what A. J. Nicholson said about Kern Spencer or what Michael Manley did about the PSC in his time, all of which criticisms are true.
But notice how these distinguished legal and media luminaries of the JLP deploy this argument. They hark back to the past not to condemn what is going on in the present, but in order to defend it! If Nicholson could do it, some ask, why fuss about Montague? Do they not see how tribal such an argument is?
This is the logic of the feud, passing down tribal hatreds from generation to generation. Upper and middle-class tribalism is the worst kind. At least working-class people don't pretend and try to cover their tribal loyalties with all manner of loathsome legalistic rationalisations. I thought that Mr. Golding's lofty words at his swearing-in meant that the new government sought to take a fresh new course. I believed this, but apparently I was wrong.