There is no passion to be found playing small — in settling for a life that is less than the one you are capable of living. — Nelson Mandela

“On the 5th May 1494 Columbus arrived at St Ann’s Bay, which he named Santa Gloria on account of its extreme beauty. Finding the Indians hostile, he anchored off the port for the night and sailed down the coast the following day to a harbour ‘shaped like a horseshoe’, now called Discovery Bay in memory of the event. There is, however, a strong belief that the honour belongs to the present Rio Bueno, a few miles farther westward.

“Here also, the Indians were unfriendly, but Columbus was determined to land; for he needed wood and water and a chance to repair his vessels. The Indians scattered before the advance of a fierce dog and Spanish crossbow-men, leaving some of their number killed and wounded on the beach. The Discoverer then landed and claimed Jamaica for his sovereigns.” — Clinton V Black, eminent Jamaican historian, Jamaica Guide

The history of our country is replete with evidence of resistance. The Tainos, widely accepted as the earliest people to settle in Jamaica — although some argue Africans were here first — resisted when the first Spaniards tried to land. Africans, who were brought to Jamaica to work as slaves on the sugar plantations, stoutly resisted their enslavement. There were numerous violent and deadly slave uprisings throughout Jamaica. After slavery was abolished and ‘full freedom’ attained on August 1, 1838, resistance continued against the variant forms of colonial rule.

The labour riots that gathered momentum and organisational shape from as early as the 1920s culminated in the grand social upheavals of 1938. The riots were a testimony to the rich spirit of resistance innate in our ancestral DNA. The majority black population had experienced enough of the repression and apartheid-like oppression of the English colonials.

In the 1940s, there were numerous demonstrations throughout Jamaica. In the 1960s and 70s social inequalities, which were still rife throughout Jamaica, led to strikes, shutdowns, shutouts and slowdowns. Jamaicans, like the Tainos, demonstrated that they were not willing to absorb like sponges the unfair treatment of social and economic systems which were pinnacled upon prejudices rooted in colour and class delineations.

In the 1980s, there were organised national demonstrations against the Seaga Government; doubtless many were organised by the People’s National Party.

In 1997, there were roadblocks in most parts of Jamaica after the then Patterson Administration announced increases on gasoline — the infamous gas tax. The ripple effect of an increase on gasoline is a no-brainer. After the fires were extinguished, a jolted Patterson — some might say scared, I say mealy-mouthed — went to Parliament and promised that things needed to radically change. His temporary Damascus experience led to the famous utterance on politics as “a fight for scarce benefits and spoils carried on by hostile tribes that seem to be perpetually at war”.

It is important to remind ourselves of the last time something nearing a critical mass of Jamaicans sent a clear message to the Government that we had had enough. And here I am not prescribing.

April 27, 1999: CNN — Jamaica responds to riots by rolling back tax

KINGSTON, Jamaica (CNN) — Jamaica’s prime minister, Tuesday, cut in half a gasoline tax that ignited deadly rioting, and promised to come up with other ways to make up the $37-million budget shortfall the rollback would cause.

A 31 per cent hike in gasoline prices April 16 –which increased the price at the pump from $1.55 to $2.01 per gallon — prompted three days of rioting that killed nine, damaged millions of dollars worth of property and rocked Prime Minister P J Patterson’s Government. More than 160 were arrested.

Last week’s unrest brought the Jamaican economy to a standstill. Gun battles erupted between police and protesters as flaming barricades shut down traffic in Kingston and other towns. The disturbances led to the cancellation of flights and cruises to the Caribbean island, which relies heavily on tourism. Foreign embassies have since lifted travel warnings.

Patterson quelled the protests by appointing a committee to find other ways to increase revenues. He said, Tuesday, he would accept the committee’s key recommendation: reducing the new gas tax by 50 per cent.

“The events of last week served to remind us any solution we devise as a Government cannot succeed without the understanding and the involvement of the people,” Patterson told Parliament. “Some lessons are hard for all of us.”

Government says new plan won’t hurt poor

He promised to present concrete plans later to make up the $37-million shortfall, adding that the new plans would “not impact adversely on the poor”.

Those plans, Finance Minister Omar Davies said, include a 15 per cent tax on interest from stocks, bonds and other investments. The measure is expected to earn $48.6 million.

To soften the blow to investors, the Government will cut the tax on savings account interest from 25 per cent to 15 per cent — a loss of $22 million — and reduce the maturity of certain savings bonds from seven years to five years.

Patterson said his Government would work to reduce interest rates in hopes of stimulating economic growth.

Police beefed up patrols before Patterson’s speech, and officials of the ruling People’s National Party met with community leaders to appeal for calm.

“Our leadership has been out in the communities doing what they are supposed to do — mobilising, organising, and preventing further roadblocks,” said Paul Burke.

Earlier, Jamaicans had threatened more protests if the tax wasn’t reduced significantly.

Kingston’s streets were calm after Patterson’s announcement, and residents said they hoped it would stave off further unrest.

“The new measures don’t sound bad, and they will keep (people) from burning down the place,” said Donna Stewart, a Kingston insurance company clerk.

The new taxes and fees would have raised $110 million to help fund a bailout of failed banks, insurance companies and pension plans. The Government blames the problems on its decision to respond to outside pressures to ease state controls in the economy in the 1990s.

Since taking office in 1992, Patterson has followed the prescriptions of international lending agencies, eliminating most price controls, privatising government enterprises, and maintaining tight monetary and fiscal policies. That agenda has helped slow inflation and stabilise the exchange rate.

However, the policies also resulted in a sharp slowdown in economic growth. By 1996, the country was experiencing negative growth, while inflation and joblessness remained above 15 per cent.

Adding fuel to the fire, Jamaicans must cope with a high cost of living. The Government admits that a single balanced meal for a typical family of five costs $43 — just about double the weekly minimum wage and equal to a few days’ salary.

— The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.

Is it that we have matured? Or is it that our spirit of resistance has been anaesthetised? A few months ago thousands were attacked by the chikungunya virus (CHIKV). Hundreds today walk with the rocking-chair evidence of the disease. The Minister of Health Dr Fenton Ferguson told the nation in a national broadcast that he knew about CHIKV two years before it landed on our shores. What did he do to prepare the country for it? He did little, if anything of consequence. Jamaicans called talk-back programmes, columnists penned articles and pointed out the incompetence of the Administration, and the Opposition remonstrated. Nothing else happened.

An Administration, schooled in recognising the new bamboo-fire temperament of our people, just waited and bided their time. Minister Ferguson has kept his job and no one has been identified as being responsible for the cock-up.

Is it that we have matured? Or is it that our spirit of resistance has been anaesthetised?

For nearly two weeks, almost a half of the population was forced to inhale poisonous smoke and soot occasioned by the latest preventable fire at the Riverton dump. The fires at the dump seem set on repeat mode to coincide with pre-Budget periods and just prior to major holidays and the start of a new year. Just a coincidence, some may say.

There are those who have an interest in the Riverton dump staying just the way it is. It is a trough, a veritable ‘feedin tree’ for those genetically connected to the politics of ‘scarce benefits and spoils’.

Is the Riverton dump the epicentre for a glorified political ‘money laundering’ scheme? Maybe the Major Organised Crime and Anti-Corruption Agency needs to do some work here. This latest avoidable fire will cost the overburdened taxpayers conservatively near $300 million. This Administration will find these funds to pay the owners of D-9, D-12, and assorted heavy-duty equipment, but they could not find the money to implement the National Environment and Planning Agency recommendations from 2012 to fix some problems at the dump. All this is happening in a country where bedlinen, blood pressure machines, and basic drugs are in short supply at many of our hospitals.

Does a critical mass of the populace care? Yes, they call talk-back programmes and post on FB/Twitter, while a few of us participate in small but significant demonstrations in accordance with the law — as we should. At the site of such demonstrations many pass and honk their horns in support; others hurry on by like the Levite priest who ignored the stranger who was hijacked on his way to Jericho. They evidently are too busy to pay attention to realities that are making all of us and our children poorer by the minute.

Is it that we have matured? Or is it that our spirit of resistance has been anaesthetised?

The air-quality test results tell us that, over the last two weeks, we have been breathing in cancer-causing substances, like benzene, in large doses. According to a release from the Health Ministry, the samples were taken during the period of March 13-14.

“Acting Chief Medical Officer Dr Marion Bullock-DuCasse said the sampling for volatile organic compounds shows that benzene was at the highest level ever recorded by the ministry.

“The high level of benzene is directly attributed to the burning at the Riverton disposal site. We consider this a significant public health issue,” she said. (Jamaica Observer, March 23, 2015)

The Ministry of Health says it is suing the Ministry of Local Government — doubtless over its stewardship of the dump. Is this a joke? The guilty dividing their guilt; or just manipulative propaganda aimed at the unsuspecting? It was Adolf Hitler who said: “Through clever and constant application of propaganda people can be made to see paradise as hell, and the other way round, to consider the most wretched sort of life as paradise.”

The People’s National Party spends the majority of its time in office fine-tuning propaganda adroitness and far less time on activities of beneficial governance. Sadly, too many of us allow them to condition us like Pavlov’s dog.

Is it that we have matured? Or is it that our spirit of resistance has been anaesthetised?

Two hundred and forty-four Jamaicans have been slaughtered since the start of the year. Most of the murders are concentrated in what are called ghettos. The privileged one per cent and their political buddies can afford to insulate themselves from the crime realities of Jamaica, land we love.

And the Minister of National Security Peter Bunting — who I am told was most upset when I characterised him as a man suffering with elephantiasis of the ego — tells the rest of us on the plantation not to be “unduly alarmed”. Sure, Minister, you have the Praetorian guards at your beck and call. Some of us, I fear, might find ourselves in the position of those who suffered the consequences of silence under Nazi Germany.

Remember this?

First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out — because I was not a communist;

Then they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out — because I was not a socialist;

Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out — because I was not a trade unionist;

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out — because I was not a Jew;

Then they came for me — and there was no one left to speak out for me.

— Martin Niemoller; opponent of the Nazis

We call talk shows, and post on FB/Twitter etc, chat in rum bars, on verandahs, while only a few brave Jamaicans risk their economic sustenance by lobbying for change through civil society groups. But by far, the majority of us do not give two hoots. ‘A suh the ting set,’ is the resort that often greets inquiries about apathy.

Is it that we have matured? Or is it that our spirit of resistance has been anaesthetised?

Shameless!

This morning — March 25, 2015 — Jamaicans who read the newspapers and/or otherwise consume local media content were greeted with the Jamaica Observer banner headline: ‘SHAMELESS’

“In a report tabled in the House of Representatives yesterday, the OCG said that its investigations into claims of corrupt practices by the former mayor and People’s National Party (PNP) councillor showed that she awarded at least $3.7 million worth of contracts to family members and close friends out of a budget of some $29.6 million during her two years as mayor of the town.

“The report said that Haughton spent $2.7 million on nine family members, and the rest on close affiliates.

“These family members included her spouse, Michael Grant; her son, Rayon Williams; her daughter, Nicollette Grant; her brother, Devon Haughton; her sister, Donola Levarrity; her sister-in-law, Carole Grant Haughton; her niece, Sgerriola Johnson; her brother-in-law, Petan Grant; and her sister, Sharon Haughton.

“The $3.7 million is much less than the $15 million which Haughton had allegedly shared out to relatives and friends during her brief tenure as mayor and chairman of the Hanover Parish Council. The OCG indicated, however, that the 12 per cent represented funds awarded to individuals with whom it could clearly establish a relationship or connection with Haughton.”

Go back to the OCG reports from the inception of that office by former Prime Minister Edward Seaga and you will see a repetition of this kind of blatant corruption. What has happened to those responsible? In most instances, nothing! In some instances a few have gained higher public office.

If a critical mass continues to refuse to see the interconnectedness between our corrupt politics and economic state, we might forever be ‘hewers of wood and drawers of water’, and our children and their children likewise.

Where do we start? Each Jamaican must begin to value himself/herself as equally important as the next and, thereafter, begin to demand better of those who lead us.

Lee Kuan Yew: Founding father of Singapore

The Chinese have an expression: The Good Emperor — a leader who makes his society measurably better economically and socially than he found it. Lee Kuan Yew was a Good Emperor.

Which Jamaican political leader can we call the Good Emperor’? Walk good, Mr Lee, you were a giant among men.

CORRECTION: “The Jamaican child born today has entered a country massively in debt. Having taken his/her first breath he/she already owes nearly US$6,700 to assorted international Shylocks. Jamaica is now indebted to over two trillion US dollars.” These figures should have been in Jamaican dollars; my humblest apologies.

When the water starts boiling it is foolish to turn off the heat. — Nelson Mandela

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