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Why not just say it outright, Mr Commissioner?
Friday, October 16, 2009
Diplomacy - especially at the national executive level - has its place.
But there are times when it just doesn't pay to skirt around certain issues.
We are talking about Police Commissioner Rear Admiral Hardley Lewin's speech reported in yesterday's edition.
According to the commissioner, we need, as Jamaicans, to collectively find the will to break the linkages between organised criminal networks, our politics, businesses, communities and the police force of which he is in charge.
We endorse his speech, of course.
However, the sad truth is that, delivered as it was in the abstract, it lacked the potency that would have served our country's leaders so well at this time. As the speech stands, there was nothing in it that would compel this administration to address the question that is on everyone's lips about the status of the USA's extradition request for Mr Christopher 'Dudus' Coke.
We need not rehearse the ugly street lore involving the relationship between Mr Coke, who is now wanted in the US for alleged narcotics and arms trafficking, and the ruling Jamaica Labour Party (JLP). Suffice it to say that when it comes to the issue of questionable linkages that need to be broken, this is perhaps the biggest and most dangerous proverbial elephant of them all.
Fast-forward to Messers Kern Spencer and Joseph Hibbert, the members of parliament for North East St Elizabeth and East Rural St Andrew respectively. What on earth are they still doing in Parliament? Lesser than they have stepped aside to facilitate the investigation and resolution of far less damning allegations.
What's so special about them?
Take the newly formed anonymous group of individuals called M Central Watch, which has not seen fit to link up with the police in their expressed intention to 'deal with' the cases of those who commit crime.
To whom will they be answerable?
Commissioner Lewin speaks about the need for a consensus, at the political level, on crime and the social evils plaguing the nation. However, it won't happen until we are prepared to be frank about who is doing what and with whom in this country, and call them to book.
For crime is not an abstract concept. It is a matter of the utmost precision which needs to be dealt with accordingly. Otherwise, there is no reason to believe that things will change in the long or short term.
For we have seen enough to know that unless named and shamed - repeatedly - some of us will never acknowledge, much less repent and turn away from the wicked ways which threaten to ultimately engulf all of us.
http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/edito...MISSIONER_.asp
Friday, October 16, 2009
Diplomacy - especially at the national executive level - has its place.
But there are times when it just doesn't pay to skirt around certain issues.
We are talking about Police Commissioner Rear Admiral Hardley Lewin's speech reported in yesterday's edition.
According to the commissioner, we need, as Jamaicans, to collectively find the will to break the linkages between organised criminal networks, our politics, businesses, communities and the police force of which he is in charge.
We endorse his speech, of course.
However, the sad truth is that, delivered as it was in the abstract, it lacked the potency that would have served our country's leaders so well at this time. As the speech stands, there was nothing in it that would compel this administration to address the question that is on everyone's lips about the status of the USA's extradition request for Mr Christopher 'Dudus' Coke.
We need not rehearse the ugly street lore involving the relationship between Mr Coke, who is now wanted in the US for alleged narcotics and arms trafficking, and the ruling Jamaica Labour Party (JLP). Suffice it to say that when it comes to the issue of questionable linkages that need to be broken, this is perhaps the biggest and most dangerous proverbial elephant of them all.
Fast-forward to Messers Kern Spencer and Joseph Hibbert, the members of parliament for North East St Elizabeth and East Rural St Andrew respectively. What on earth are they still doing in Parliament? Lesser than they have stepped aside to facilitate the investigation and resolution of far less damning allegations.
What's so special about them?
Take the newly formed anonymous group of individuals called M Central Watch, which has not seen fit to link up with the police in their expressed intention to 'deal with' the cases of those who commit crime.
To whom will they be answerable?
Commissioner Lewin speaks about the need for a consensus, at the political level, on crime and the social evils plaguing the nation. However, it won't happen until we are prepared to be frank about who is doing what and with whom in this country, and call them to book.
For crime is not an abstract concept. It is a matter of the utmost precision which needs to be dealt with accordingly. Otherwise, there is no reason to believe that things will change in the long or short term.
For we have seen enough to know that unless named and shamed - repeatedly - some of us will never acknowledge, much less repent and turn away from the wicked ways which threaten to ultimately engulf all of us.
http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/edito...MISSIONER_.asp