THE Jamaican Airline Pilots Association wants to buy Air Jamaica. But if JALPA cannot, they will take the same money that they would buy Air Jamaica with and buy or lease some other airline. The idea is a very good one and should be supported whatever the outcome of their negotiations. But whatever name they chose for their airline, the word “Jamaica” should be in it.

I had a telephone discussion with JALPA president Captain Russell Capleton. According to Capleton, who at one stage of his student days at Jamaica College was in the same form as myself, the bid is not just to save the jobs of the pilots because pilots can get jobs. The problem is the stewardesses and the ground staff, including those who work in the office.

I have suggested to Russell Capleton that as JALPA sets up its own airline, it should become part of a co-operative that buys into the hotel industry, with the JALPA airline company flying in the tourists. In this way, the JALPA initiative would benefit a wide cross section of poor Jamaicans. It is really full time that ordinary Jamaicans own the commanding heights of the Jamaican economy. This was the view of national hero Norman Manley and also the world view of the Roman Catholic Church.

From as far back as the encyclical Mater et Magistra (Mother and Teacher, 1961) by the late Pope John XXIII (1958-63), the church has been advocating worker ownership of business enterprises. And I will never get tired of stating that the Roman Catholic Church started the credit union movement in Jamaica.

It is not surprising that Russell Capleton would be the person to push this proposal on behalf of the workers at Air Jamaica. Capleton grew up as a Roman Catholic and would go to Mass at 6 am before going to Jamaica College in the morning. His thinking is also in keeping with the nationalist spirit of his late father who was the member of parliament for Western St Mary from 1972 to 1976.

The JALPA move is an idea whose time has come. It certainly has widespread support all over the country and could become part of a ferment for change. From what I am hearing, the idea has support whether or not they were late in bidding for Air Jamaica, whether or not their interests are best served by forming a separate airline or whatever. And this whole thing ties in very well with the celebration of Black History Month.

In the 1970s, the government encouraged co-operatives within the sugar industry. For the first time in Jamaica, ordinary cane-cutters had a share in ownership of the industry. At that time Michael Manley was the prime minister. To a large extent the Roman Catholic Church was involved in the organisation of these co-operatives through Father Gerald McLaughlin and Father Joseph Owens, among others.

When the government changed in 1980 the new government crushed the sugar workers’ co-operatives even though they had been efficient, according to the late Dr Carl Stone and Father Gerald McLaughlin. Was the then registrar of co-operative societies bullied into cancelling the registration of the sugar workers’ co-operatives? Was he threatened with dismissal? Was this a conditionality of the International Monetary Fund? Was this a conditionality of the monied class?

Then in 1983, the government of Jamaica decided to sell the Daily News, which had been bought by the government in the 1970s when that defunct newspaper got into financial difficulties. The workers at the Daily News made a bid to buy the newspaper and form a co-operative, but the government, which between 1980 and 1989 was led by Edward Seaga as prime minister, turned down the offer and closed down the media house.

Sometime in the 1990s, Mutual Security Bank was sold to National Commercial Bank. When the invitation for bidders was made, the Mutual Security Bank Staff Association made a bid for the bank. The Staff Association president was sent on long leave while the bank was purchased by NCB.

Why the reluctance to allow workers the opportunity to own the commanding heights of the economy? The reluctance is of the same variety as the one that resisted the movement for the emancipation from physical slavery. It is of the same variety that resisted the calls for self-government and political independence. It is of the same variety as the one that resisted and turned back many moves to empower Jamaicans in the 1970s.

While JALPA is their own trade union, the trade unions in this day and age should be encouraging worker ownership everywhere. It will mean that the trade unionists will have to change their modus operandi, but the change is needed.

Yes, JALPA may have been late in their bid, but this time around no one will be able to stop JALPA from owning something, even if they form their own airline company. All co-operatives and all plans of workers to buy shares in business entities gain popularity in hard economic times like these.

ekrubm765@yahoo.com