Dear Editor,

While I completely agree with East Portland MP Daryl Vaz’s criticism of justice minister Mark Golding’s misplaced priorities in flogging his obeah law through Parliament, Vaz misses the big picture. Not for the first time, the method in the madness of Mr Golding has flown right over his head. He just doesn’t get it.

As Vaz correctly observes, desperate times call for desperate measures. Which is precisely why Mr Golding has moved with Bolt-like speed on this issue. Never mind important matters like scrapping the jury system entirely so that the justice system can breathe. That can wait forever. Our justice minister has obviously concluded that the situation is so desperate, it is now beyond prayer. So, just as the law has been amended to legalise the government’s desperate raid of the NHT funds, so too the law has to b e amended to legalise the government’s desperate access to the obeahman’s always wise counsel. Especially on the Law of Trusts.

If there is one skill set that these desperate times will bequeath to Jamaica it is this: how to laugh and cry at the same time.

Errol WA Townshend

Scarborough, Ontario