The following is a lightly edited version of the presentation at the 2017 Norman Manley Lecture:

Forty-nine years ago, on July 4, 1968, the People’s National Party (PNP) celebrated Norman Washington Manley’s 75th birthday with a banquet. It was a moving occasion, as N W announced his retirement from politics. In his response to the toasts N W seized the opportunity to remind the audience that the mission of his generation “was to create a national spirit with which we could identify ourselves as a people for the purpose of achieving Independence”. He went on to challenge the next generation “to proceed to the social and economic reform of Jamaica”.

N W, with characteristic modesty, grossly understated the achievement of the generation he led. In 1938, his generation had founded the PNP, which pledged itself “to develop the idea of Jamaica as a nation whole… and to the development of that national spirit”. Unfortunately, when Independence came in 1962, his party lost the elections that year and Jamaica was deprived of the vision and leadership that would have laid the foundations for full flowering of the national project.

N W would have been mortified at the results of the poll in 2000, which showed that the majority of Jamaicans thought Independence was a mistake, and Jamaica would have been better off as a British colony.

In the 1949 election campaign, the PNP presented its “Plan for Progress”. Although the Jamaica Labour Party narrowly won the elections, they quickly adopted the PNP’s plan as the blueprint for the industrialisation and expansion of the Jamaican economy.

The PNP won the 1955 General Election and Norman Manley led the Government up until 1962. In those seven and one-half years, Jamaica achieved average annual gross domestic product growth of some 6.7 per cent and developed the three new sectors — manufacturing, mining and tourism — which had been added to the old agricultural economy.

Under N W’s leadership, education was revolutionised with the doubling of the enrolment in high schools. The modernisation of the curriculum in technical schools and the establishment of the College of Arts, Science and Technology to provide the skilled labour required in the manufacturing and mining sectors were significant achievements.

The renegotiation of the agreement with the bauxite companies increased the rate of earnings from the sector by over 600 per cent. The period is remembered as the “golden age of tourism” with the establishment of the Jamaica Tourist Board and sustained growth in visitor arrivals. The trade deficit was eliminated. Jamaica became the leader among developing countries.

Despite this unprecedented progress, N W was keenly aware that too many Jamaicans had been left behind, and the wealth had been concentrated in too few hands. His deepest regret was the failure to develop rural Jamaica with a radical land reform programme as the basis of a modern agricultural sector.

What led Norman Manley to view land reform, the agricultural sector and rural development as the centrepiece of Jamaica’s economy?

Born in 1893, in the parish of Manchester, he grew up in the period when the sugar industry had virtually collapsed, and it was the fruit industry, led by the small farmers of his own parish, and medium-sized farmers like his father, which saved the Jamaican economy.

On his return to Jamaica in 1922 after studying law in England, he had devoted his legal expertise to the establishment of the Jamaica Banana Producers Association, a growers’ cooperative in which thousands of small farmers had made Jamaica the world’s leading producer of bananas, which became Jamaica’s major export crop.

In 1943, one year before the first general election under adult suffrage, he presented a ‘Plan for Agriculture’ in a series of articles which were published in The Public Opinion.

Long before the PNP formed the Government, Norman Manley was clear in the view that the Jamaican people, given access to land, credit, technology, and markets, could make agriculture the centrepiece of Jamaica’s economic development.

Confident that the PNP would win the 1955 election, he prepared a master plan to revolutionise agriculture. This included:

• the establishment of a Ministry of Production with agricultural development as the main plank.

• the settlement of tenants permanently on the land they occupied.

• acquisition of lands for farmers, using land bond issues

• provision of irrigation, soil surveys and electrification

• the establishment of food forests

• making Jamaica self-sufficient in food

• a Faculty of Agriculture at the University College

• an enlarged Farm School

• short-term training schemes

• agricultural colleges

• expansion of the 4-H Clubs

• an Agricultural Credit Co-operation

The PNP was duly elected in 1955, and before the end of the year Norman Manley took the Land Bonds Law to the House of Representatives to enable the Government to acquire land for farmers with land bonds as the method of payment. Next came the Registration of Titles Law to give farmers access to credit by a radical overhaul of the land-titling process.

Despite his passion and pioneering spirit, for a variety of reasons domestic agriculture grew by only 2.3 per cent. Rural/urban migration accelerated with the displacement of the rural population following the spread of the bauxite industry. The agricultural revolution was never completed.

However, much was achieved because of the impetus for national development unleashed by N W Manley and the subsequent generations.

A sound constitutional and political order was established, and Jamaica has consolidated a functioning electoral democracy with regular and peaceful changes of government.

This has included the entire panoply of basic rights, such as freedom of the press, freedom of assembly, an independent judiciary, etc.

Our cultural life and our sporting accomplishments have had a vibrancy that has caught the attention of the world, so that names like Bob Marley, Jimmy Cliff, Usain Bolt, and Merlene Ottey, have become world renowned.

There was no doubt either that the dynamism of economic growth and social policies such as the Common Entrance Examination, unleashed by Norman Manley in the 1950s and continued into the 1960s, pulled many out of poverty and ignorance.

Nor could it be denied that subsequent efforts, whether it be the quest for social rights, housing in the 1970s under his son Michael, and the drive for modern infrastructure under P J Patterson — all made their contribution. And yet, today — 50 years after Norman Manley’s retirement, his national project is in crisis.

Despite the gains in securing educational access, we are still leaving behind some 50 per cent of each school-leaving cohort without adequate certification to continue to further their education.

As a consequence:

• Approximately 70 per cent of our labour force has no certification.

• Some 20 per cent of the population subsists below the poverty line, with the rural population reflecting the worst conditions.

• Some 700,000 Jamaicans are squatters in the land of their birth.

• Antisocial behaviour and crime are rampant, with the murder rate among the highest in the world.

We should therefore not be surprised that so many are opting out of participation in the political process. But we dare not succumb to complacency, nor can we, as the political heirs of N W Manley, give up on his vision of nationhood. To advance this vision, to persist in his mission, it means that we have to accept the fact that profound changes to Jamaica’s social and economic fundamentals are needed. To be frank, we need a new radicalism, not one rooted in ideology, but in the necessary policy changes and political framework in order to generate a rebirth of the national project envisioned by N W Manley.

It is against this background that, on being elected president of the People’s National Party, I have sought to lead the party to fulfil our founding leader’s mandate for the generation that succeeded him, by launching two critical commissions.

They are:

• The Land Ownership Commission

• The Youth Employment, Innovation and New Economy Commission

The Land Ownership Commission is mandated to recommend radical and effective strategies, systems and mechanisms to:

• significantly improve and facilitate legal ownership of land by Jamaicans;

• increase the number of registered parcels of lands in Jamaica, through a simplified system of land registration, thereby facilitating easier commercial transactions and wealth generation activities for Jamaicans;

• reduce the time frame for the registration of land;

• address long-standing land tenure issues, and regularise informal occupiers (squatters) of land throughout Jamaica.

The Youth Employment, Innovation, and New Economy Commission is mandated to develop the appropriate economic policy framework and New Economic Action Plan to modernise and transform globally competitive areas of the Jamaican economy in the short and medium term that would leverage the energy and talents of Jamaica’s youth (18-35) and contribute to levels of sustained equitable economic growth required to raise the living standards of all Jamaicans.

This comprehensive approach will consciously seek to develop new modes of regional development throughout the inner countryside in contrast to the usual focus on the major coastal towns, as that is urgently needed in our country.

While the framework will seek to enable innovation, creativity and sound business outcomes for young people across a range of sectors, there are some sectors of focus that the commission will examine closely to inform specific recommendations. The sectors of focus are determined based on what will likely remain globally competitive, even as the world economy advances with artificial intelligence, and will enable a significantly improved standard of living for Jamaicans living in the countryside and urban centres. Some of these sectors have already combined to make Brand Jamaica strong. With a focused enabling framework, an engine of dynamism and growth could be unleashed for:

• music

• entertainment

• fashion

• sports

• nutraceuticals (including medical cannabis)

• technology development (animation)

• high-level skills outsourcing services – legal, accounting, etc

• food/gastronom

• tourism through AirBnB

• care services: nursing, retirement villages

I will shortly be announcing a third commission on education.

N W Manley’s departure in 1969 impacted the future leadership of the PNP. Michael Manley succeeded N W, and his campaign manager was P J Patterson. To complete the cycle, P J Patterson was elected vice-president at the same 1969 party conference, with Portia Simpson as his most active campaigner. I had just entered The University of the West Indies and taken my stand with the most oppressed and disadvantaged.

Today, as I open the N W Manley Public Lecture Series in the parish of his birth, the best we can do to honour his life and work is “to proceed to the social and economic reform of Jamaica”.

Dr Peter Phillips is the leader of the Opposition and president of the People’s National Party.