MOSTLY, it was a cross between a big party and a cat-and-mouse game between the security forces on that stretch between St Catherine and into the parish of Clarendon. Although someone did throw a Molotov cocktail at the Jamaica Public Service (JPS) building in Manchester Street, May Pen, Clarendon’s capital.

The firebomb broke through the glass front of the building, but didn’t ignite. It seemed, too, that for most of the day, the staff remained in the office, although they were not available for comment.

In fact, by midday, with the early September sun beating down intensely, most of the demonstrators had dispersed; the town was relatively clear.

Central Clarendon MP Mike Henry was still around with the stragglers. May Pen is Henry’s town. It is part of the constituency he has represented for more than two decades.

“I’m here hoping to contain the anger of the people – and my own,” Henry says. “I hope the government takes heed of what the people have to say today.”

The message of yesterday’s demonstrations, mounted by the Opposition Jamaica Labour Party in Clarendon and across Jamaica, was supposed to have been that Jamaicans are fed up with rising prices, especially for utilities, such as the light and power provided by the JPS.

One channel for that message is, of course, the press. Yesterday, the Observer logo on the car, a reporter with notepad in hand and the presence of a photographer was a powerful draw. Especially in Chapelton, normally a lively little town in Northern Clarendon.

It is early afternoon, although the sun has by now passed its zenith, it is still hot.

The demonstrators are already drifting away.

In a flash they are back, waving placards, singing party songs and reciting the litany of grievances that underscored the protest – high electricity bills, increased bus fares, new phone rates, the government’s failure to remove tuition fees for secondary schools. and more.

The declaration from Pearnel Charles, the JLP MP for North Clarendon, is remarkably similar to his colleague, Henry, across the way. It would seem, almost, that they had compared notes.

“The party is trying to get the Jamaican people to assist in getting the government to respond to the plea for help,” says Charles. “The hardship, the corruption, the inequity – the people plead to us, the MPs, and they are crying for justice.”

Things have gone well, he asserts. No lawlessness. No violence.

“We aren’t blocking any roads here – we don’t have to,” he boasts. “We have the cooperation and support of all the people here.”

The police agree that the affair has, for the most, been peaceful in North Clarendon.

“The people were no hassle whatsoever,” says Inspector Peart of the Chapelton police. “They demonstrated peacefully. They did not block any roads, although we will be watching the situation all day.”

But business are taking no chances.

In the town square, the local branch of National Commercial Bank is closed.

At Clarendon College, school is out early – not because of the nearby demonstration, according to teachers. With limited transportation on the roads, the aim is to give students and teachers an early start, allowing them to reach home early.

It’s a little later, but still early afternoon. Most of the organised protestors have retired.

The “freelancers”, it appears, have come out. They mount road blocks. Now, it’s something more sinister. The barricades include broken bottles, nails, barbed wire and rocks.

This is more like what had been seen earlier in some areas of St Catherine – the regular fare at demonstrations in Jamaica, with the bonfires, black acrid smoke, tree trunks, old fridges and the skeletal remains of cars. This day, at one place, there is a 10-ft corrugated, galvanised-zinc fence. It might have been uprooted from its place or residence and made to lie in the road.

It all looks very threatening. But the people manning the road blocks seem, for the most part, good-natured and in high spirits.

Along the Mandela Highway, the main thoroughfare into the capital from St Catherine, the road blocks are set about 25 metres apart. They have been there since 5:00 am, their mounters boast.

Police and soldiers remove the roadblocks every so often, but as they move on to another place, the protesters replace the barricades.

In the intervals between the roadblocks young men play six-a-side football, or are hanging out, listening to the blaring dancehall music.

“We a let people through, still,” says a young man who is among the group that is incharge of the zinc fence blockade, a stone’s throw from the Central Village Police Station. “All like the two ambulance dem, dem neva even haffi stop.”

Chimes in another: ” And we nah charge no money neither!”

Maybe not at this barricade. But elsewhere, motorists, in some instances, had to pay as much as J$1,000 to be let through the barricades.

A JLP presence is at this demonstration. Donovan “Floppy” Guy, a member of the St Catherine Parish Council for the Twickenham Park Division, extols the discipline of his party’s supporters.

“This is just a peaceful demonstration,” Guy tells the Observer. “It’s not about the gas prices, it’s more about the police, about school fees, the JPS, bus fares, the MOU – everything.”

Within Spanish Town, St Catherine’s capital, the roadblocks – and people – are few and far between. Except for atop the iron bridge near the hospital. From up here the emerald-green Rio Cobre meanders below. A small, but vociferous throng chide passers-by for not joining the demonstration.

At the railway lines at Crescent Road near Ellerslie Pen, a large group of jubilant Labourites chained the gates of the level crossing to a large rock. Then they watch in amusement as police officers take turns at filing through the inch-thick chain with a slim hacksaw blade.

The mid-morning sun is hot and the officers perspire.

Heavily.

Eventually they succeed in cutting through the chain.

A cheer goes up.

“Easy DC (district constable),” calls a wit from the crowd.

“yuh work hard!”

There is laughter.

Says another of the crowd’s fast-talkers: “A hope they see an raise yuh pay, cause police money a one a the thing we a block road fah!”

The police are not particularly amused or taken in by this declaration of solidarity.

“This is the sixth time this morning that we’ve cleared this section of the road,” one exasperated officer complains. “I don’t know why the proper authority doesn’t come to remove the debris so that they can’t use the same to block the road every time we clear it,” he sighed.

In Old Harbour, the situation threatens to get ugly. There are tussles between the police and protesters. Eventually, tempers calm. However, most shops in the small town close early or didn’t open at all.

“We don’t have no gun,” one protester shouts at the police. “We a do it peaceful, like dem seh we fi do. Dem seh we nuh fi gwaan wid nutten, an we nah do nuttin,” disgruntled protestors shout at the police.

-campbello@jamaicaobserver.com