Dear Editor,

As I look at my six-year-old daughter, filled with innocence and laughter, I’m filled with rage, disgust and disbelief that I live in a country that seems oblivious to the most heinous of crimes. I want to wake from this nightmare called Jamaica, land we love. At what point will we take a stand as a country and demand that our leaders tackle the elephant in the room called crime and violence? How heinous should the cause be for us to cringe with disgust when we read the papers and listen to the news? Jamaica, wake up!

You are asleep if you believe that the waiver of taxes for foreign investors is the solution to our economic woes. Let’s think again. Wake from your eternal slumber and see the reality of the country we love so much. The nightmare called Jamaica, land we love, is riddled with corrupt cops, self-interested politicians, lotto scammers, sex offenders, rapists, and other criminal elements that are not shackled by the law.

Now, what level of tax breaks do investors need that will make it okay for their women and children to be brutally raped? Jamaica, you need to wake up and realise that we are focused on the wrong remedies to the maladies we are experiencing as a country. I put it to you that there will be no investor willing to risk being raped, shot while pregnant, being chopped to death by an angry mob, having to pay top dollar for essential government services: just to receive tax breaks?

Jamaica, wake up and smell the stench of rape, murder, and corruption. You need to realise that until we cauterise the crime and violence, improve the justice system, and effectively implement swift capital punishment, we will not come out of this economic degradation that we are in. We cannot continue to sleep and live in denial, believing that we are not affected.

I want to wake up and watch my daughter grow as I did, enjoying all this country has to offer. But who am I? Just a citizen of this country who has finally woken up.

Gavin Jord

Kingston

gavinjord@gmail.com