It has now become a self-evident truth that Jamaica is not an easy place to do business. This was summed up in remarks attributed to two leading members of the Simpson Miller Administration who said at different times that Jamaica is an inhospitable place to do business and that those who play by the rules get shafted. You could also add the remark that your idea of leadership is that it is when you are well into destroying the forest that the leader gets up (probably climbs the tallest tree) and cries “wrong jungle.” So much of what goes on in Jamaica reminds us that we are indeed in a wrong jungle. Most of the good cedar and mahogany have been chopped down, but one is yet to hear a clarion call that we are indeed in the wrong place.

It is the IMF, a foreign economic powerhouse, that is trying to pull us out of this jungle. It is a jungle of profligacy and mismanaged national resources. It is a jungle characterised by corruption, slackness and nastiness. It is a jungle where the “weed” of bureaucracy is so thick that it is only the person with bulldog tenacity who would dare to take it on. It is a jungle with a civil service that is so moribund, still given to archaic methods of doing business, that if you should send home 3000 to 5000 of public workers tomorrow, the country would not miss a beat. I am not calling for arbitrary dismissal of persons though our new master, the IMF, seems inclined for this to happen. One can curse the IMF all we want and call them in these days hegemonic, as I heard one leading trade unionist did, but it will not change the fact that they are the only game in town- our last great hope if you will.

In this wrong jungle the clamour for increased salaries by government workers is not unjustified especially since they have not seen an increase for the past five years. But this has to be squared with the ability of the employer to give it. The government has offered what in the scheme of things appears to be a small increase, but an increase nonetheless. This offer has been strongly resisted but the government has remained adamant that it cannot pay more. And this might rightly be the case if it is to hold the gains that have been garnered so far under the strictures of the IMF. In a conversation with Nationwide, Mr. Bert Van Selm, the IMF representative in Jamaica, failed to budge from the position that there can be no easing of the IMF conditionality of the 9 percent of GDP wage bill agreed to by the government. He was quick to point out that this was part of the government’s recommendation in coming to an agreement with the Fund.

The Government, or at any rate, Dr. Phillips, the finance minister, in arriving at the agreement with the IMF knew instinctively that agreeing to a wage freeze and maintaining salaries within the boundaries set, would be Jamaica’s Sisyphean moment. It is now in the belly of that moment and one can imagine that with Local Government elections due and the general just down the road, this is not the time to anger public sector workers, especially teachers. Yet, if it is to meet its targets, the government has no wiggle room short of sending home workers. Vacancy by attrition has not helped and will not help in the short run. With the exigencies faced in passing the quarterly tests everything for government seems to be in the short run.

This is perhaps why it has not been able to get meaningful growth in the economy. It is so preoccupied with passing the tests that its focus on short term growth strategies has been cauterised. There is not a single dollar that is not pinned down that does not get taxed. And what get taxed the most are the producers themselves. It is a basic, elementary economic fact that you cannot grow an economy by excessively taxing the producers in the economy. Excessive taxation crushes the entrepreneurial spirit. Manufacturing, against great odds, has shown some growth, but so much more could be achieved if our trade policies, especially with our Caricom partners, were recalibrated to give Jamaican products a greater chance in the Caribbean marketplace. But in an effort to meet the IMF targets, the government’s ingenuity is seen more in its ability to come up with creative ways to wring more funds out of the private sector. They fail to see that the cloth has become dry; there is no more water to be wrung from it.

Another factor, perhaps insignificant in some people’s minds, especially the present government’s, is the fear of the finsac “duppy.” Many who survived that “economic genocide”, and that includes family members of those so savaged, are still wary of losing their shirts to predatory strategies by a government whose policies they consider hostile to capitalist, free market methodologies of building wealth. The report on the finsac debacle has not yet seen the light of day, but let us not forget the tribal culture that spawned the demise of so many seasoned and aspiring entrepreneurs.

This culture has not died and people are wary of getting shafted in it. In this tribal political culture in which businesses have to survive, the tentacles of partisan politics quickly choke those who dare to criticise the governing party. It has been known that even prominent members of the private sector choose not to criticise out of fear of being punished by the ruling elite. The inability of the government and more particularly the ministry of finance to grant waivers might have come as a blessing in disguise as people now have to play on the same level playfield. The IMF by insisting on an end to waivers might have carried out inadvertently one of the most important aspects of political campaign finance reform. Despite these strictures, there should be no doubt in our predominant tribal culture about a ruling party’s ability to find ingenious ways to favour the deserving loyalist in the allocation of contracts and plush appointments on boards with all its attendant perquisites. Neither is there any doubt about the ruling elite’s penchant to rain down fire and brimstone as it seeks economic vengeance against those who fail to toe the line. Of one thing there can be no doubt: in this wrong jungle called Jamaica where tribal loyalties still predominate, both the PNP and the JLP read from the same playbook. The only difference is that one book is orange and the other green.

Dr Raulston Nembhard is a priest and social commentator. Send comments to: stead6655@aol.com