Dear Editor,

Shameful is all I could think of the treatment of medical doctors by the Andrew Holness-led Administration. And this at a time when the country is far from free of the novel coronavirus pandemic.

Yet, it is part of a pattern: The recurring preference for spending money on physical infrastructure, highways and bridges, rather than on the social issues which include nurses, doctors, front-line staff.

Shameful, equally, is Andrew Holness’s stubborn insistence on building 15,000 houses on the Bernard Lodge lands, which is so suited for growing the food the country needs but is importing at huge cost.

Yet, it is part of a pattern: Check Peter Espeut’s letter of June 25, 2021 elsewhere. It exposes the regular Holness Administration doublespeak on the environment.

Shameful, above all, is the stubborn recourse of depending solely on the security forces to resolve a problem that is also deeply rooted in the social ills of society. Norwood is the latest example. Prime Minister Holness accepts from the police its identification of six gangs — two really, but with splinters — which is all within its competence, but the social challenge associated with these gangs is not within the Jamaica Constabulary Force’s (JCF) charge and competence. Even National Security Minister Horace Chang, a physical infrastructuralist like no other, has begun to catch a glimpse of the social reality that concrete block fences, sewage drains, and renovated police stations do not address. Relations between youth and youth, youth and parent, and some social differences in gangs and criminals must be given attention.

Shameful is the readiness to accept current murder numbers and people’s hurting.

Shameful is the placing of election success over people’s lives.

Some in Government have lost all sense of shame.

Horace Levy

halpeace.levy78@gmail.com