AN outbreak of violence between the neighbouring communities of 57 Waltham Park Road (Mongoose Town) and Tavares Gardens (Payne Land), has caused the Hunts Bay police to increase patrols in both areas.

“These people can be described as hostile tribes who are perpetually at war,” said a policeman assigned to the Hunts Bay station.

“We have tried many times to diffuse the situation, but the will for peace must come from within the communities themselves,” the cop, who refused to be named, said.

According to residents from both sides, the conflict has been ongoing since last Christmas Day when a teenager from Payne Land was stabbed and then shot dead near to the Mongoose Town community. Since that killing, the tension has heightened and violent acts have been perpetrated by both sides.

Both communities are strongholds of the ruling People’s National Party and are nestled in the constituency represented in the Parliament by Local Government Minister Portia Simpson Miller. Geographically, they sit approximately 150 metres apart.

Residents on both sides agree that politics has nothing to do with the conflict. In fact, Simpson Miller had been instrumental in bringing peace to the troubled community before last month’s general elections and both sides agree that the fragile peace broke down soon after the electoral contest was over.

When the Observer visited the Mongoose Town community Tuesday, the presence of the police was evident. Residents in the area pointed to two burnt out homes which they said had been torched by persons from Tavares Gardens two weeks ago.

Two Sundays ago, an 8-year-old child was shot in the pelvic region, her mother was shot in the leg, a man received injuries that resulted in a broken leg and one man is still in hospital nursing burns he received during an arson attack, the residents said.

One man in Mongoose Town claimed that bad blood has been brewing between both communities for a number of years and that this latest flare-up was in keeping with tradition.

“Is an ongoing conflict over the years,” the man said. “The man dem from Payne Land say is one order and they want to rule us. Them feel like them can come in and rape and beat people.

He also said that a gang from the Payne Land area called ‘One Order’ was behind the violence which was being unleashed on the people of Mongoose Town.

The man also gave an insight into the teenager’s slaying last Christmas, saying “A youth from over there and some youth from over yah did inna war. Him come over here and get stab up. They then killed a cable man (Oliver Holness — shot dead along East Road in August) for revenge, them always come over here come shoot up, beat and kill. It reach to a level that the police have to be here all the time.”

However, citizens from the Payne Land area denied the accusations levelled against them by the Mongoose Town residents. They claimed they had been the ones who were hurt most by the violence. They said persons who live in their area have been attacked by persons from Mongoose Town whenever they travel through that community. Things reached to a head late last month after the body of 18 year-old Melissa “Tullu” Gordon of Building 16 in Payne Land was found with four gunshot wounds and a slashed throat along Espuet Avenue.

Gordon’s grandmother, Lorraine Wilson, was still in mourning as she explained that her granddaughter had not yet been buried.

“We just going to get her cut the 21st and she going to be buried on the 24th,” Wilson said as she wondered aloud why someone would want to harm her grand child.

Other residents in the area expressed the desire for the violence to end as, in their eyes, “Christmas a come an people can’t even walk free”.

“Right now, we sit down here, we haffi a look out. Them a drive round in a grey car and say they want 10 man and 10 woman. Them shot up the Rastaman and chop the little schoolgirl that was coming from school. We can’t live so no more, man,” a skimpily-clad woman told the Observer.