We're not for a moment begrudging the immediate promotion of the policemen who last Thursday blew the whistle on their rogue colleagues at the illegal gun shop on Munster Road in East Kingston.

Of course they deserve to be acknowledged and commended for what they did. Encouragement does, after all, sweeten labour and there's no counting the many lives that might have been saved as a result of their endeavours.

Somewhere amidst the celebration though, we get the rather worrying impression that these good officers are being rewarded for going beyond the call of the duty expected of them.

And while we are extremely encouraged by their display of courage and character, we cannot afford to lose sight of the fact that they were just doing their job.

We use the word 'just' not to minimise what they did, but rather to highlight a far more dangerous trend within this entire society, to label as spectacular, things that would be quite ordinary within a less corrupt context.

In so doing, we unwittingly reinforce the negative, albeit difficult-to-deny implication that integrity is the exception rather than the norm in Jamaica.

This is sad, because it is just not true; it is dangerous because constant reinforcement will make it so.

Yes, corruption is rampant and becoming more so, especially in high and low places. However, we refuse to get on any bandwagon that would seek to subvert the fact that there is far more to Thursday's find than meets the eye.

We call no names and knock no responses, but Thursday's find begs several questions, the answers to which should have been sought by those in charge of the Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF), a very long time ago.

One of these questions concerns the status of the system responsible for ensuring the integrity of the JCF's armoury.

For it is no secret that the armoury has long been emanating a fishy stench, about which many questions have been raised in this and other sections of the media.

Who can forget the mournful wail of former Police Commissioner Mr Lucius Thomas in 2005, telling his men and women that there were those among them who were selling ammunition to gunmen.

We cannot recall ever getting a conclusive answer to any of these questions which we expect will again come to the fore given Thursday's find.

We are highly supportive of the interviews, the polygraph tests, the investigations -- every aspect of the Anti-Corruption Branch's plan to clean up this one.

And, hopefully, when the police armoury and stores are reopened, the JCF would have moved yet another step further en route to eradicating that most dangerous of all felons: the enemy within.

Acting Police Commissioner Owen Ellington is an astute policeman and clearly meant well in promoting his brave men. But we encourage him not to miss the critical lesson in all of that. Things are desperately desperate.

We wish him every success.

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