KINGSTON, Jamaica – 

Member of Parliament for St Ann South East, Lisa Hanna, has repeated a call she first made in an article in the Sunday Observer newspaper, by way of a motion in the House of Representatives on Tuesday, calling for reggae icon, Bob Marley, to be named Jamaica’s eighth national hero.

In moving the motion in the House, Hanna repeated much of what she wrote in the Observer article. However, the significance of her motion in the House is that it is now in the parliamentary records.

The Opposition MP, in her motion, described Marley as a “global icon of peace, freedom and love”. She cited that “Marley’s messages have stirred movements for revolutionary social change which have helped and continue to shape black consciousness and courage to fight against systems of injustice towards the marginalised and dispossessed in Jamaica and globally”.

Hanna said Marley’s lyrical activism for the poor and disenfranchised “created a momentum that forced forward progressive, social legislation for ordinary working class Jamaicans and Africans in the 1970s”.

She added that: “Whereas Bob Marley has led the peoples of the world to reorganise and accept our Jamaican indigenous reggae music, our indigenous spiritual practices and culture of Rastafarianism.

“And whereas Bob Marley’s work and life have made principled contributions to the recognition of Jamaica internationally and thereby inspire the Jamaican people to greater appreciation of their own culture and more confidence in their capacities to thrive and overcome”.

The Opposition MP noted that Marley’s ‘One Love’ has been translated into almost every language worldwide and was named the song of the millennium and his 1977 ‘Exodus’ named the best album of the 20

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 century.

Hanna said Marley’s kindness, selfless example and courageous work to empower disenfranchised black people and other people of colour around the world earned him the United Nations Peace Medal of the Third World on behalf of 500 million Africans in 1978.

She pointed to his contribution as a poet, nationalist, humanist and Africanist to Jamaican and the global development and international progress which she said has manifested in spheres of human endeavour as diversed as education, religion, tourism, business, sociology, history, identity and the arts.

Continuing, Hanna said: “And whereas Bob Marley is already a global hero for many persons worldwide who have erected statutes of his likeness to inspire their people.

“And whereas the National Honours and Awards Order of National Hero Regulations 1970, provides that the National Hero motto is: ‘He built a city which has foundations’ which has clearly been evident in the life and works of Bob Marley.

“Be it resolved that this honourable House in Jamaica’s 60

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 year of independence, call on the Governor General to take the necessary steps for the national honour of Order of National Hero to be conferred on the international crusader for peace, love and equality, a global superstar, the honourable Robert Nesta ‘Bob’ Marley”.