The burgeoning crime problem which is battering our country is one which should fill us all with outrage. But to what end? We seem to have become so inured to the predations of the criminal elements among us over the years that a kind of resignation has set in. This is a dangerous path to take as a country.

In any civilised society, citizens would have been outraged at what is happening, for example, to the young among us. There now seems to be a deliberate, orchestrated and well-planned attack on our youth, especially our young girls. A dysfunctional sexuality has been let loose on the land. This is manifested in carnal and incestuous abuse, the abduction of young girls ostensibly for sexual pleasure by brutish male beasts in organised sex rings and a host of other deviant sexual behaviour that seem to be of recent origin and to which we are not accustomed in Jamaica. My suspicion is that much of this dysfunctional sexuality is being fuelled by the Internet and the easy access to cable television all over Jamaica. This is not to berate the Internet or cable television, but to call attention to what seems to have become a desire to cater to the baser elements of our nature.

Other than a few isolated mutterings, one has not heard of any great outrage from the church community about that 11-year-old boy who was dismembered in St Mary or young Ananda who, it was recently revealed, was the 11-year-old who was mutilated and thrown on a hillside like a scrap of meat. What will we make of the death of young Suckra in Westmoreland? Until we are sufficiently outraged by these acts of savagery, we will not as a citizenry take the collective action that is needed to deal resolutely with the problem.

And we need all hands on deck to deal with the growing mayhem in the society. All sectors have to be engaged fully with a display of outrage and productive anger that will send a message to the criminal elements that we have had enough and we will take it no more. Rest assured that things can and will get worse if something is not done soon to really deal with crime which the government is yet to declare a crisis of monumental proportions. The church, the teachers' associations, the private sector and all sections of civil society have to be involved.

The government has to be the primary driver in all of this. There is no problem that should preoccupy the mind of the prime minister as "driver" at this time than this monster which is reaching uncontrollable proportions. If he cannot sleep at night, the cause of his insomnia should not be that we are facing a financial meltdown or that pet development projects are being stymied by recalcitrant civil servants. It should not be that the image of his government is being tarnished by lacklustre performance from some of his ministers. It should be that the country over which he presides is fast becoming a criminal state; that the first duty of his government which is to guarantee the safety and security of its citizens is not being carried out, whatever the pretensions to the contrary.

Mr Prime Minister, you need to step to the front and give the fighting of crime prime ministerial authority. You need to focus on the problem with laser-like intensity by calling all the leading sectors of the society together and impressing upon them their role in fighting this monster. In other words, Mr Prime Minister, you need to lead a collaborative effort and galvanise your citizens behind a collective agenda that will ensure no sanctuary to the criminal element within the 4,411 square miles of real estate that is Jamaica. We can putter along with the myriad problems that our society faces, but we will reach nowhere as a society where fear of being killed or maimed is the dominant emotion of our citizens each waking day.

Yes, Mr Prime Minister, we can continue to live with the economic rape of our country over the last 20 years. We can continue to meet with a grunt, sigh or shaking of the head the revelations of grave errors and even malfeasance on the part of our public servants. Many of us understand that these "servants" know that our system of justice will not cause them any discomfort in the short term, and that is only if they are caught with their hands in the cookie jar. We know that some have become quite adept at milking the public teat and covering their tracks to the meadow.

But we cannot live with the level of crime as we are now experiencing it. It is no longer hyperbole when we say that the problem is killing us. It is, Mr Prime Minister, and it is getting worse. You need to take charge even if you have to take over temporarily the national security portfolio to give the fighting of the problem the prestige it deserves. We are at war with the criminal elements in our society, Mr Prime Minister. Show us that you and your government are sufficiently outraged at what is happening by leading the collective effort that is necessary to end this nightmare that is upon our beloved country.

Teachers and accountability

Now that the government has been coerced into signing the massive salary contract with the teachers, we must now look to the teachers for accountability in their performance in the classroom. Let me hasten to say that I do not begrudge the teachers their pay increase. I believe that they deserve every cent of what they will get. For years they have been poorly paid. Many of them work hard, for they have understood the virtues of educating the young minds that come before them. But many are not that mindful. They merely see the teaching profession as a step to something else. Governed by this interim mentality, they merely drag themselves through the school day waiting for the bell to ring.

So while we want them to be well paid we must insist that they give value for money. Education in Jamaica is broken, and nowhere else is this brokenness seen than in the classroom where the eagerness to learn and the enthusiasm to teach are at an all-time low. The administrators of education must insist on a set of performance criteria and strongly enforce them. They must not be afraid to weed out those who fail to perform.

stead6655@aol.com

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