JAMAICA’S political leaders seemed to be at cross purposes as to whether, after 45 years of Independence, the country has succeeded in achieving the goals of its founding fathers.

Speaking during the National Independence Day Parade at King’s House in Kingston yesterday, Opposition Leader Bruce Golding said Sir Alexander Bustamante’s dream of independence and Norman Manley’s vision of reconstructing the social and economic life of Jamaica were yet to be realised.

“What if Bustamante and Manley were alive today what would they say of us? I say without apology that we have let them down,” Golding declared.

“Forty-five years after, their dream is yet to be fulfilled. The foundation that they laid should by now have been supporting a much greater structure of peace, stability, development and prosperity. We must make amends, we must make haste, we must make up for lost grounds,” Golding said unapologetically.

Conceding that there were areas in which progress has been made, Golding said there were also “too many areas in which we have fallen down”.

“We have made too many mistakes, missed too many opportunities and suffered too many reversals. There is much ground that we have lost, much ground that we must make up,” he pointed out.

Golding said what was “missing” from Jamaica’s progress over the years was the “compelling, inspiring goal of independence and nationhood” which had been the driving force behind Bustamante, Manley and the generation they led.

“What is the national goal that unites us today? What is the common ground on which we stand? What is the collective purpose to which we are all prepared to commit ourselves and which transcends political and all other divisions. I suggest that is what is missing, that is what has eluded us over these 45 years,” he said.

“Let us find that common ground, that collective purpose so that just as it enabled us to achieve the goal of independence we will be able to use that independence to actualise the dream to build a nation that is just, strong, peaceful and prosperous,” Golding urged.

Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller, who took the dais after the opposition leader, said there was much that Jamaica could be proud of since Independence.

“Today Jamaica with its modern highway network, up-to-date telecommunications systems and advances in health and education is on the path of progress, on course to becoming a developed country.

“The 45 years have not been wasted. We have achieved much. Of course there is much more ground to cover and much more work to do to fully realise the vision of our heroes,” Simpson Miller said.

The prime minister said while the process, which began then has not yet been completed, the country was still on the road which its forefathers had mapped.

“We have not yet completed that process, but this is the road on which we have been walking for these 45 years and the few who once doubted our ability to progress as a nation have been proven wrong,” the prime minister said.

The annual National Independence Day Parade was conducted with the usual fanfare and cultural performances redolent with old world charm. In attendance were Governor General Professor Kenneth Hall and his wife Rheima, high-ranking members of the Jamaica Constabulary Force and the Jamaica Defence Force, members of the diplomatic and consular corps, the Judiciary as well as other government ministers.