I recently wrote an article titled ‘1980 election: What if the PNP had won’. This article was specific to our crime and gang crisis and was intended to analyse if our country would be any better or worse in respect of the aforementioned gang crisis.

The 1980 General Election was chosen, based on its relevance, as being the one that occurred which ended the six-year civil war.

The 2011 General Election occurred at the end of another period of turmoil. It was held soon after the famed joint security operation into Tivoli Gardens, Jamaica’s bloodiest clash between State and citizenry since the Morant Bay Rebellion in 1865. It occurred after a month-long stand-off with a gang that had controlled aspects of Jamaican life. That operation ended its infallibility.

It could have been the beginning of the end of garrisons and gang domination of most of our inner cities. This did not occur. Gangs continue their control of inner cities and squatter settlements in most Kingston and St Catherine ghettos. They have political identity, even if they no longer are politically controlled.

So the question is: Would it have been different if the JLP had won the 2011 General Election?

Well, if they continued down a road of dismantling the zones as they did in Tivoli Gardens, then maybe.

However, this is a big ‘if’.

They had time after the initial battle when they defeated ‘Fort Tivoli’. However, they didn’t move in that direction. They, in fact, moved in an entirely different trajectory and created the INDECOM Act — hardly a step indicative of a country about to wage war with the most brutal and institutionalised street gangs in the western hemisphere.

However, let us assume for a while that they intended to finish the job they started. It would require resources applied to many zones to include Arnett Gardens and Tawes Pen, to name a few.

They likely wouldn’t resist police so there would be no battle, unlike Tivoli where the battle was motivated by the extradition warrant for their don.

They would require occupational troops which the country simply didn’t and doesn’t have, so they would have been at a terrible disadvantage.

The human rights groups also would have opposed the possibility of more carnage, but they could have been ignored. However, this could and would have led to eventual international condemnation.

The Opposition, which would have been the People’s National Party obviously (if we are looking at this as a change of victor), would also have opposed the drive. Why? Because they like the gangs controlling our poor? No, not at all. Rather because that is what Opposition members do.

So here lies our crisis. I can categorically state that this election of 2011, like the 1980 election, would not make us different in respect of ending gang domination. Why? Well largely because of the logistics and the fact that we are poor and a free democracy — one or both of which would have to change for us to defeat this enemy.

However, as confident as I am that any ruling Government, irrespective of political party, would like to see the end of the nonsense that our parents started in the seventies and for us to return to being a Caribbean country which respects life, is as sure as I am that no party in Opposition wants the gangs defeated. Why? Let me explain.

The brass ring, the holy grail, is the party that defeats the gang crisis and brings us back to civilisation. No party wants to see the other do it. The parties know that the party who accomplishes that feat could rule for decades.

What matters most to a political party is winning. Everything else is secondary.

That is why the two-party system is a failure anywhere it is used. This is because it is dependent on adversity.

How many times have you heard one Opposition party compliment a decision made by a sitting Government? Never. So how can you trust a system like this?

It all should begin with putting the country first, then the political party.

Until we stop putting party over country, everything we do is a performance intending to divide and confuse, with an aim to mislead the public.

Winning is too important — and unless this changes, our present crisis will forever be our future.

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