Tweet
Globally - unsurpassed glory; Locally - same old story
PAGE 1 EDITORIAL
Monday, August 25, 2008
With the planet celebrating the awesome track prowess displayed by Jamaican athletes in Beijing, China, it is harder to stomach the weak-kneed surrender of our national dignity at home to Spanish-owned RIU Hotel by our Government.
At any other time, it would still have been painful to read the story in our Friday edition that the St James Parish Council, in a hurriedly called meeting, approved the illegal building plan under which RIU has built three four-storey buildings as part of its Mahoe Bay Hotel near Montego Bay.
This was done in the direct flight path of the Sangster International Airport only three kilometres to the east.
But it is more painful now that we have just, in devastating fashion, demonstrated unsurpassed courage, strength and determination in grabbing an unprecedented 11 medals - six gold, three silver and two bronze - at the 2008 Olympics. What a dramatic contrast!
What it is that the RIU Hotel is bringing to Jamaica that is so much more valuable than Jamaican lives being endangered in the event that a large aircraft gets its wings tipping the high buildings?
We are aware that the St James Parish Council came under tremendous pressure from special interests in the ruling Jamaica Labour Party to get the Government to relent, especially after Prime Minister Bruce Golding came out stridently against the building breaches at Mahoe Bay. The present silence of the PM is deafening and curious. What explains this retreat?
We note that the hastily called parish council meeting came while the nation was preoccupied with the Olympics and we wonder if the architects were hoping to slip it by us quietly in a kind of underhanded 'behind-our-back' shenanigan.
It also comes before the results of the government-ordered probe into the illegal building activities have been made public. The Police Fraud Squad is supposed to be investigating how the signature of a parish council official and the council's official stamp came to be on the RIU plans, without first being seen or approved by the council.
The insult to the Jamaican people is even worse because Kingston Mayor Desmond McKenzie is breathing fire against building breaches in the capital and threatening, as he should, to demolish them.
Historically, no Jamaican has been able to build more than three storeys in the flight path of the Sangster Airport. They would have been summarily locked down, chased out of the country or vilified to the point of shame and degradation.
The Jamaican people must be asking who is running our country - the Spanish or the Government? Why don't we just hand over the reins of government to them? After all, the Spanish once ruled Jamaica.
http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/edito..._OLD_STORY.asp
PAGE 1 EDITORIAL
Monday, August 25, 2008
With the planet celebrating the awesome track prowess displayed by Jamaican athletes in Beijing, China, it is harder to stomach the weak-kneed surrender of our national dignity at home to Spanish-owned RIU Hotel by our Government.
At any other time, it would still have been painful to read the story in our Friday edition that the St James Parish Council, in a hurriedly called meeting, approved the illegal building plan under which RIU has built three four-storey buildings as part of its Mahoe Bay Hotel near Montego Bay.
This was done in the direct flight path of the Sangster International Airport only three kilometres to the east.
But it is more painful now that we have just, in devastating fashion, demonstrated unsurpassed courage, strength and determination in grabbing an unprecedented 11 medals - six gold, three silver and two bronze - at the 2008 Olympics. What a dramatic contrast!
What it is that the RIU Hotel is bringing to Jamaica that is so much more valuable than Jamaican lives being endangered in the event that a large aircraft gets its wings tipping the high buildings?
We are aware that the St James Parish Council came under tremendous pressure from special interests in the ruling Jamaica Labour Party to get the Government to relent, especially after Prime Minister Bruce Golding came out stridently against the building breaches at Mahoe Bay. The present silence of the PM is deafening and curious. What explains this retreat?
We note that the hastily called parish council meeting came while the nation was preoccupied with the Olympics and we wonder if the architects were hoping to slip it by us quietly in a kind of underhanded 'behind-our-back' shenanigan.
It also comes before the results of the government-ordered probe into the illegal building activities have been made public. The Police Fraud Squad is supposed to be investigating how the signature of a parish council official and the council's official stamp came to be on the RIU plans, without first being seen or approved by the council.
The insult to the Jamaican people is even worse because Kingston Mayor Desmond McKenzie is breathing fire against building breaches in the capital and threatening, as he should, to demolish them.
Historically, no Jamaican has been able to build more than three storeys in the flight path of the Sangster Airport. They would have been summarily locked down, chased out of the country or vilified to the point of shame and degradation.
The Jamaican people must be asking who is running our country - the Spanish or the Government? Why don't we just hand over the reins of government to them? After all, the Spanish once ruled Jamaica.
http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/edito..._OLD_STORY.asp
Comment