PRIME Minister Bruce Golding is being hailed by some supporters as a courageous, ‘transformational’ leader, taking on the politically risky challenge of smashing the criminal networks operating under the cover of ‘garrison’ communities, starting with Tivoli Gardens in his own West Kingston constituency.

The argument is that Mr Golding deserves praise for doing what successive administrations have failed to do, namely, severing the connection between organised crime and garrison politics — a link that has long been identified as a root cause of Jamaica’s high rates of violent crime, especially murder.

Given the concerns among all social classes about Jamaica’s unenviable reputation as one of the more violent places on earth, and given the negative impacts on the economy and society it is only natural that well-thinking Jamaicans would support reasonable measures to tame the beast.

However, discussion about the prime minister’s new found resolve against criminality must be placed in a wider context of the need to reconstruct a broken political and governance structure. And it’s too early for adjectives like bold, and courageous, and transformational; it’s also too early to be dismissive.

Judgement on this scale will require time — time to see whether Mr Golding stays the course dictated for him by circumstances rather than embraced by deliberate choice. It will require evidence, evidence of actual outcomes and not mere promise of performance.

One explanation for the superlatives is that the current situation is a crisis that ‘should not be wasted’. Further, because the fight against organised crime and garrison politics represents Mr Golding’s only way back to political safety, he will carry the fight with more zeal and energy than anyone else. And civil society is well placed to hold his feet to the fire.

It has also been suggested that this route was better than the resignation alternative which he said he considered.

I disagree. Resignation would set a new, high standard for accountability that would be the basis for the electorate to treat with all political leaders in the future. They would know that there was a high political price to pay for certain transgressions.

It could have led to effective anti-corruption instruments, including separating people from inexplicable wealth acquired through corruption, crime or both.

Further, it would have given the political leaders a basis on which to hold accountable those who report to them. Surely, there must be a systemic and structural problem when Contractor General Greg Christie has to make the same point over and over again about tourism officials committing the country to huge financial risks with foreign airlines without prior Cabinet approval. They don’t have to take him seriously.

Reality though, is that resignation is not going to happen — not on the basis of what is now known about either the handling of the extradition request or the structure, organisation, ownership and management of the criminal networks that the security forces have been given a free hand to smash.

From that vantage point, the issue is not the future of Mr Golding as a member of parliament for West Kingston, leader of the Jamaica Labour Party or prime minister of Jamaica: It is reorganising our politics to give better governance and better results in terms of human development.

In examining this issue, we need to remember always that the security operations, and the State of Emergency that gave the security forces “extraordinary” powers to conduct them, were pursuant to a warrant to arrest Christopher ‘Dudus’ Coke to initiate extradition proceedings in relation to an indictment on drugs and gun charges in the United States.

Armed supporters barricaded themselves in the Tivoli Gardens community to keep the security forces out.

Three weeks later, the warrant has still not been executed; some 73 community residents and one soldier lost their lives; scores have been injured; and hundreds, maybe thousands — especially children — will bear the psychological trauma of war for a long time. Property damage is yet to be measured, and some evidence suggests abuse by the security forces. These cases must be investigated.

Some other evidence suggests that sections of the community were command and control centres for organised criminal activity; media reports speak of a torture chamber and execution centre and bodies found in shallow graves. The image of a crude and violent ‘justice’ system is difficult to resist.

As with the alleged excesses by the security forces, these too will have to be investigated and explained because we must resist the temptation to stigmatise entire communities of law-abiding citizens who may just as likely be victims as they might be beneficiaries of garrison politics and zones of exclusion.

The origins of the present crisis

Further, we must always remember that the crisis came to pass after Mr Golding and others in his administration used every means available to lobby the Barack Obama administration to get the US not to pursue the extradition request. This was clearly a misuse of the ‘awesome power’ of the office of prime minister. And then he misled Parliament and the country about his role in the affair.

In these circumstances, the coalition of forces that pushed Mr Golding against the wall must remain vigilant and demand that he carry out his pledge to implement several key governance reforms, including measures to reverse the institutionalisation of political tribalism and garrisons, provisions for the impeachment of public officials, laws to regulate political party financing; criminal sanctions for breaches of the award of contracts, and Parliamentary oversight in the appointment of certain statutory positions.

This is a long list, not easily accomplished by a politically wounded leader facing an Opposition not only intent on opening the wounds but increasingly showing signs that they understand that they cannot expect to waltz back into Jamaica House because the Government is weak.

The Opposition was right in pushing the no-confidence vote although they did not have the numbers to defeat the Government.

Portia Simpson Miller and the PNP are right about conditional support for the proposed anti-crime legislation: The security forces must have appropriate resources but human rights cannot be surrendered.

The PNP must go beyond insisting on safeguards about respecting human rights. They too must be unswerving in their resolve to reverse garrison politics and political tribalism which, for too long, have marginalised poor people by pitting one group against another.

And they have to embrace new and effective institutional arrangements, such as a prosecutor general to fight corruption and illicit enrichment.

Finally, we must acknowledge that recent events in West Kingston have broken the Tivoli Gardens model of development and political management. It should not be re-created in the old way but on a new basis where the authority of the State is no longer subservient to the authority of the member of parliament and, more recently, the don and the criminal networks.

On the economic side, the effort must not be about finding new multilateral and domestic resources to fill the welfare gap left by the broken criminal networks.

It must be about creating jobs and economic opportunities inside and outside the communities so that people can begin to develop their innate capacities.

Until it becomes clear that that is what is being undertaken, civil society groups that forced the prime minister to retreat might be well advised to hold their applause.

kcr@cwjamaica.com