I am the father of two children both, of whom are the loves of my life. I am grateful to the Almighty God that I have been so blessed that I have been able to see them grow to adulthood, and in their own different ways they are now making their separate investments in time and effort to become responsible adults.

This is the wish that every parent everywhere in the world has: To be able to share in the joy of the survival and maturity of their offsprings. No parent wants to have to bury their children and, even worse, no parent wants to have their children plucked from the safety and comfort of the space that they share as home — regardless of whether it is a mansion or a hovel — by those sworn to provide for their security and be brutally murdered one way or the other. This is the reality of the testimonies being heard in the continuing enquiry into the misadventure ordered by the Government of Jamaica in May 2010 that claimed the lives of more than 70 Jamaicans.

The testimony of Jamaica Defence Force soldier # 3, who spoke of witnessing two policemen calmly shooting to death two young men who were bound and seated in the detention area, before marching a third unarmed man to the back of the building and taking his life, was graphic enough.

The testimony of Marjorie Williams, the mother of two young boys, Fabian Grant, 20, and Fernando Grant, 17, both of whom were, according to her testimony, ordered from her house by the police, even more harrowing. According to her, both boys obeyed the order to leave the house. They were then told to kneel on the sidewalk with their hands on their heads. The woman testified that she followed her sons outside, but was ordered back inside by the police. Williams said she complied and started peeping through a missing window downstairs her house, from where she could see her sons lying down in a garden at a nearby residence and could also hear their cries. “Both of my sons were crying and the police said ‘shut up, boys, you going dead today’. “I stepped away and not even a second I hear Fernando cry out, then I heard an explosion,” she said. “I hear Fernando say ‘Mummy, Mummy, dem kill Poopsy’.”

She said that shortly after she heard her son crying out that they were going to kill him, she heard an explosion. Williams said she later looked outside and saw a policeman and a male resident dragging the body of one of her sons and putting it in a truck that was parked on the road. The witness testified that the male resident was also killed.

Williams said when the police and soldiers left with the bodies of her sons, she went to the scene and saw one foot of the orange slippers that one of her sons had been wearing. (Jamaica Observer report)

I was moved to tears after reading these statements; just two of the many witness statements presented to the Tivoli Enquiry that attest to the alleged wanton destruction of human lives by members of our security forces. In the instances outlined, all of those killed were unarmed and in the custody of their killers. Both of the events related speak to cold and callous murder; and even in war — as we saw in the US engagements in Iraq and Afghanistan — such killings, once investigated, have resulted in penal sanctions against those found guilty.

We in Jamaica cannot talk about social justice and peace within troubled communities specifically, and in Jamaica generally, when we allow our security forces to get away with murder. This is what Opposition Leader Andrew Holness and Member of Parliament for Kingston Western Desmond McKenzie, as well as every other Jamaican who suggested that the enquiry was a waste of time, was actually supporting by calling for an end to the proceedings.

We cannot expect that, as a country, we will ever be able to record any meaningful social advances when the lives of some of our citizens do not matter. We cannot seriously call out for punishment of rapists and child abusers when we allow blatant murder to be committed by agents of the State, and its perpetrators go unpunished. This is what Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller needs to rail about as she did this past Sunday at the closing session of the People’s National Party’s 77th conference. By keeping silent on such capital offences as a Government, as a nation we have provided an open track for others to commit other offences. Our silence on Tivoli 2010 provides a blank cheque for the commission of similarly grievous atrocities.

richardhblackford@gmail.com