As you get older it is harder to have heroes, but it is sort of necessary. — Ernest Hemingway

WITH rapidly dwindling support for this the worst Administration since Independence, the birds are singing. Some are singing like John Chewit (a bird that comes to Jamaica in the summer to nest), others like the Banana Quit (a bird found generally throughout Jamaica and other islands of the West Indies), and some as the black-bellied plover (a bird that visits Jamaica both in autumn and spring on passage between summer and winter quarters).

A few of the tunes are strongly and openly condemnatory of the present leadership style of Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller, and so the birds all agree, in order to avoid a total wipeout at the next polls, whether they be local and or general elections, an urgent rescue plan is needed to pull the PNP out of the unpopularity dead pool. Some birds, mostly the Banana Quit, are fearing a repeat of October 30, 1980, when Edward Seaga rescued this country from “stoppages, outages and shortages” (coined by Seaga, Parliament, 1979) the hallmarks of a crazy experiment presided over by Michael Manley, a benchmark for political disappointment.

While the prime minister recently admonished at a party meeting that Comrades should be careful of what they post in cyberspace, she must remember that there is such a thing as traditional conduits of communications, which are as powerful, if not more powerful compared to social media interactions — especially after a few glasses of sorrel/pimento wine mixed with overproof Jamaica white rum [of the JB strength.

Since I don’t drink alcohol, I will not say much more on that score. Except that some human behaviour experts maintain that when some people are drunk and angry they utter words that reflect the deep-rooted thoughts in their subconscious and conscious minds.

I am told by a John Chewit that there will be no local government elections this year. Instead, the PNP will focus on a rescue plan patterned on how Romans emperors would create massive distractions [the games at the colosseum, also known as the Flavian Amphitheatre] whenever the empire was threatened. Strenuous efforts, I am told, will be placed on public consultations leading to Michael Manley being crowned a national hero. I am told that the prime minister will begin, in the middle of 2015, a series of meetings across the island similar to the Live and Direct meetings that P J Patterson held across Jamaica after he resigned in the midst of the Shell Waiver Scandal. These meetings will seek to reconnect with the party’s hardcore as the primary objective and, more broadly, the wider voter population.

For those who are figuring on a Cabinet reshuffle — me included, before new information — at the start of the New Year, you can ‘fahget it’, to steal a phrase from Patterson. The John Chewit is sure this will only come after the budget presentation. They are also not ruling out the possibility of a leadership change if things don’t turn for the better by the end of 2015. The John Chewit says we should have as many as three visits from African leaders/heads of State before the end of 2016. This is the usual subliminal use of the race card tactic, which has been used several times by the PNP.

A Banana Quit spouted that the Tivoli Enquiry is not providing the political mileage that some in the PNP imagined. It is felt that too much sympathy is being earned by the victims of the incursion, and that the ‘hidden objective’ of further demonisation of Tivoli, and by political osmosis the JLP, is pressed into the background. It should be interesting to see what unfolds when the commission resumes its hearings next month.

The Banana Quits is deeply concerned that the ‘No growth, No Hope Economic Model’ will get the country nowhere and will only cause greater disaffection and fallout, especially among the PNP hardcore. He feels

that a massive JEEP-type programme, supported with savings from the fall in oil prices, is needed sooner than later. This mother of all pork barrels, he says, must be far-reaching so much so that it touches on the middle and upper classes in ways never before seen in Jamaica. He seems to agree that the first half of 2016 is the best time for such a programme, while a few others feel that it should commence nearer the end of 2015 to coincide with the crescendo effect that is hoped for when the prime minister would have concluded her propaganda tour across the country.

The Banana Quits and the Black Bellied Plovers are extremely worried that the industrial relations scenes in 2015 will foster greater disaggregation of support for the PNP. After six years of wage freeze, government workers are expecting decent increases in wages/salaries and fringe benefits. Thus far, I have heard from the grapevine and other sources that the Government is offering five per cent in year one and two per cent in year two, and very little else with regard to fringes benefits that will have, let’s say, monetary consequences. The Banana Quits are especially fearful that there will be strikes, shutdowns, shutouts, and slowdowns unpreventable because of the IMF restrictions. The fund, it is said, favours another year of emolument freeze for the public sector.

Between glasses of pimento wine ‘properly’ laced by them, the Plovers espoused serious concerns about the Government continually cutting the capital side of the budget to suit the demands of the IMF, primarily debt payments. Hospitals that are out of basic supplies, police vehicles that have on tyres smoother than a baby’s bottom, an NSWMA that cannot adequately collect garbage, the ‘non-paying-over’ of statutory deductions from government workers’ salaries, and the general unemployment epidemic in the country terrify them. They support the view that Dr Peter Phillips needs to be given a greater role in leadership of the Government, to include an ‘official’ designation as deputy prime minister. This, they feel, would dilute the widespread perception that the prime minister does not have a clue, against the background of the PNP being seen historically as poor managers of the economy when compared to JLP.

Many PNP ‘ginneygogs’ are on pins and needles even in the midst of the holiday season, as they see their political fortunes threatened by a public majority who do not believe their rhetoric about the logistics hub, Highway 2000, and numerous other pie-in-the sky mega- schemes that so far have not borne the fruits that were promised three years ago.

Since great efforts will be made in 2015 to ‘officially’ [some might say] make Michael Manley into a national hero, I suggest to those who will give final approval to such a measure to consider another Jamaican citizen more deserving of such an honour.

Who? Dr the Hon Thomas P Lecky, PhD, OM, OJ, OBE (1904-1994).

Thomas Lecky was born on a small farm in Portland in 1904. The first Jamaican to receive a PhD in agriculture, his work would revolutionise the Jamaican dairy industry and improve the lives of countless small farmers.

Lecky began to dream of a new breed of cattle, a Jamaican breed. He turned his attention to the study of animal genetics and earned degrees in agriculture from McGill University and Animal Husbandry from Ontario Agricultural College, Guelph. At Guelph he focused on evaluating cross-breeding as a means of acclimatising European cattle to Jamaica’s environment. He concluded that the answer was not an acclimatised European breed but a new breed, a completely adapted tropical breed. He returned to Jamaica in 1935 and started to test his ideas.

He used two lines of cattle and began to select bulls for breeding from the best producing cows in Jamaica. In 1949, Lecky gathered his documentation and travelled to the University of Edinburgh where he used this research as the basis for his doctorate.

His dissertation, entitled Genetic Improvement in Diary Cattle in the Tropics, presented his ideas for developing a tropical dairy breed and catapulted him to international acclaim. It considered the two main processes by which species or breeds adapt to new environments — natural selection and mutation.

Natural selection dates as far back as Charles Darwin and is essentially the idea of survival of the fittest. Those members of a breed with qualities most suited to a location will survive and dominate. Mutation is the idea that actual changes are made in genes themselves for many different reasons. After a period of time, the gene pool of a later generation may, therefore, differ from the original gene pool. Lecky noted this in animals he observed in Jamaica, where some cattle showed significant improvements after a period of 20 years.

By the early 1950s, Lecky saw his ideas realised, and the first examples of genetically bred cattle, named Jamaica Hope, were ready. They were a combination of the British Jersey cow (small, and light feeding) with the Holstein (heavy milk producers) and the Indian Sahiwal

breed (disease-resistant and adapted to the tropics). The Jamaica Hope could produce up to an average of 12 litres of milk a day — three times that produced by other cattle on the island. Lecky’s work revolutionised the Jamaican dairy industry and, indeed, the dairy industry around the world. Scientists from many different countries flocked to Jamaica to see what he had done. Lecky’s work impacted on the development of cattle in many tropical countries.

The Jamaica Red

Not satisfied with the Jamaica Hope, mainly a producer of milk, Lecky turned his attention to creating a Jamaican breed able to produce meat. He worked with cattle farmers and looked carefully at Indian cattle. He selected from amongst a few breeds of Indian cattle that had been brought into the island and created a new breed known as the Jamaica Brahman, which has since become popular also in Latin America. Farmers had noted that the imported English Red cattle, which had not proved resistant to ticks and tropical disease when bred with the Jamaica Brahman, produced cattle of top quality beef. This breed became known as the Jamaica Red — the main meat-producing cattle on the island.

The Jamaica Black

Still not satisfied, Lecky decided to focus on cattle that could live in the cooler areas of the island, where other breeds were unable to thrive. He bred the black Aberdeen Angus from Scotland, well adapted to cool temperatures, with the Jamaica Brahmans to produce small, black cattle called the Jamaica Black. Yet, even though some claim it has the best quality of beef on the island, the Jamaica Black proved to be the most difficult breed to care for. Not surprisingly, it did not prove to be as popular as its two predecessors, the Jamaica Hope and the Jamaica Red, among cattle farmers.

Lecky retired from government service in 1965, but remained available as a consultant until close to his death in 1994. Indeed, he was at work at his beloved Bodles Research Station until a week before his death, having dedicated over 60 years of his life to the development of Jamaican livestock. Prior to his passing, T P Lecky received one of Jamaica’s highest civilian honours, the Order of Merit, for creating new breeds based on foreign cattle that reproduce on their own without acting like cross breeds or hybrids. He also received the Norman Manley Award for excellence.

A countryman at heart, Lecky took greatest consolation from knowing he had helped small farmers like his parents improve their lot. He is remembered as the father of the Jamaican dairy industry.

It is very sad that the powers that be in Jamaica seem to believe that only politicians and/or political types are qualified to become national heroes, a mentality that needs adjustment. Maybe we could earnestly address this deficit in 2015.

NB: Full credit to research done by Dr Rebecca Tortello for the information on Dr T P Lecky.

A dead man who never caused others to die seldom rates a statue. — W H Auden

Garfield Higgins in an educator and journalist. Comments to higgins160@yahoo.com