PLEASE let me express my condolences to the Hussey family on the loss of their patriarch Lawrence. Also, condolences to the family of Col Trevor MacMillan who served with distinction in every aspect of his national career in the JDF, the Customs RPD, the JCF, the Ministry of National Security, and in personal life as a key security consultant. May they rest in peace.

Well, murder, corruption, fraudulent actions, calls for retaining persons of integrity, and name-calling continue to be at the forefront of the news, eclipsing previous weeks of similar events. News, especially bad news, tends to garner the headlines of the media and move any positive achievements to the back burner.

The "political gangs" continue to resist the label that has been quite rightly applied with a broad brush. It is possible that there are persons in each party who do not deserve that derision, but they have not sought to distance themselves from those who are really guilty, and so they probably deserve the name by not publicly disassociating themselves from the rest. Therefore they remain under the roof of their respective Ali Babas, and cannot be other than the 40 thieves! Such is the nature of a gang.

I can't resist reminding the readers of the charges and counter-charges and how they are easily allowed to change sides with regularity. The current PM is angry with the WikiLeaks revelations and says they are the result of some malicious agenda (seemingly referring to The Gleaner).

He does not remember that when the PNP was in power during the 1970s, then PM Michael Manley accused that newspaper of similar motives and labelled them as the "whores of North Street". It at least seems that governing parties are the target and "same knife stick sheep stick goat".

The PNP has targeted the PM as "pathologically mendacious" without remembering the illegal graffiti of the 1970s all over citizens' private walls labelling the then PM a "Man Lie", and the IMF as "Is Manley Fault". This malicious practice simply cost the private owners of defaced premises several gallons of unnecessary paint, without recourse for any payment for gang-related vandalism.

The current PM is "upset" by the alleged meddling of "foreign interests" in determining who is placed in governance of this "sovereign" nation. I suppose he has forgotten their years in Opposition in the 1970s as they constantly projected Communism and especially Cuba's influence in a negative light. Their first act after regaining power was to expel the Cuban ambassador, but today they are the best of friends (but only if they do not require political asylum here in Jamaica).

At the same time, the PNP as Government covered the vacant walls with the quaint spelling of Seaga as "CIAGA", clearly referring to an alleged plot to overthrow the Government driven by the CIA operatives of the United States Government. To be called a capitalist was to be designated as an enemy of the State and an ideological pariah, and yet today both parties have embraced the economic values perceived in the system.

I wonder if any of the two parties recognise how many complete turnarounds they have made. I have, and I am so dizzy that I can hardly see where or even what direction lies before us in the quest for a better life. The very fact that they can spin eternally without our noticing is merely a manifestation of the low esteem in which they regard us.

Perhaps we may need our own Memorial Day in order to remember the atrocities visited on us by these two gangs, and remember the victims of this local holocaust.

Professor Trevor Munroe has been calling for the nation to request the contractor general to take another contract. My friend Trevor is happily "born again" for the pursuit of the integrity of the nation and I admire him for his recent, almost relentless struggle against corruption.

Perhaps a truth and reconciliation commission could hear the truth about how the now defunct Workers' Party of Jamaica was funded during the 1970s, and the names of the contributors, voluntary or otherwise, and whether there was support from any unsavoury elements given to that movement. A "mea culpa" would be a first step towards final redemption and acceptance.

Many persons are often confused by my persistence in reminding of the state of affairs that have not been resolved over the years. I have been on a quest for peace since the first march for peace in West Kingston in 1976, and the persons there were all memorable in their own peculiar way.

From Claudie Massop and Aston 'Bucky Marshall' Thompson, all the way to Mr Seaga, and businessmen of goodwill led by Carlton Alexander, they all marched for peace.

My recollections of this as a young man of 25 who trod that path remain stamped in my memory. Most of those marchers have either died or have been forgotten (Massop shot over 40 times by the police and Thompson allegedly killed by "the gangs of New York").

But I have had 35 years to have the nightmare of a paradise lost, and the memory haunts me to this day. I remember selling thousands of gaudy pink acrylic T-shirts announcing the Bob Marley Peace Concert, and the photographs of this event are framed and hanging on a wall in my home "Lest we forget".

I recall it as a moment of possible national salvation lost without much hope of recovery, at least not with the insidious and unhealthy state of the two gangs. Their very appearance seems to be directed towards discouraging persons of goodwill with trained intellects and honest intentions from serving in any capacity, even as they seem to attract villains. As Shakespeare wrote, "a pox on both their houses" is applicable at this time.

We need a good "bush bath", a memory enhancer, and a new system of governance in this country.

Please remember to register to vote.

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