The attempt to foist Lieutenant General Rocky Ricardo Meade (ret’d) on the public service as Cabinet secretary, which thankfully has been foiled, has raised quite legitimate constitutional questions as well as concerns at home and abroad.

These questions and concerns have to do with ideology, public policy, the role of the State, the continuing delegitimisation and demeaning of civil servants and the perceived militarisation of the Jamaican society.

Leaving aside the legal considerations and most of the other concerns, I wish to touch, ever so slightly, the contextual issues of the militarisation of public service and specifically its relationship to the treatment of crime and violence.

Proceeding from the logic — best articulated by Dennis Chung, leading evangelist of Dr Nigel Clarke’s neo-liberal church — that Jamaica’s existential problem was one of indiscipline, lawlessness and disorder, the JLP Government elected in 2016, on a promise of “prosperity”, held that crime represented “an insidious obstacle to growth”. Therefore, “the only way”, it argued, “to secure a better future for the Jamaican people and sustain higher economic growth [was] by decisively tackling crime.”

To this end, the Government outlined a series of measures, the central plank of which was an expanded role for the army, the one institution that was feared, trusted and respected. Accordingly, the size of the army was increased by active recruitment and by means such as the Jamaica National Service Corps (JNSC) which was established in 2017 following an amendment to the Defence Act. The JNSC, ostensibly designed to turn “at risk youth” into “agents of positive change in their communities”, was in reality a new recruitment agency for drafting hundreds of young people into the Jamaica Defence Force (JDF). If it is discipline young people lacked, what better institution to impose it than the JDF, the argument went.

Ronnie Thwaites, an Opposition politician, church deacon and “media influencer”, was one of its strongest proponents. In recognition of the increased number of his troops, two-star Major General Rocky Meade was soon promoted to three-star Lieutenant General Rocky Meade.

To demonstrate the priority it attached to crime reduction by way of correction and enforcement, and to complement the increased troop numbers, the Government significantly augmented military expenditure. Between 2017 and 2019, there was a whopping increase of 85 per cent in Jamaica’s military expenditure from US$144 million to US$266 million ($41.2 billion) to expand the size of the military and make it better resourced and equipped. The austere fiscal year (FY) 2018/19 budget maintained a primary surplus target of seven per cent of gross domestic product (GDP) but increased capital spending by more than $11 billion (0.5 ppts of GDP) relative to FY 2017/18 budget, to three per cent of GDP, with the majority ($7 billion) of the increase allocated to the Ministry of National Security. This after a major spike in the murder rate in 2017.

To “help enhance their information and mobility”, the boys were provided with expensive fancy toys on which the clergy offered benediction and a generous sprinkling of holy water.

The National Identification System (NIDS), which was an unstated part of the strategy, was dealt a severe setback by a responsible Opposition (in this case) and an alert judiciary which, on several occasions, has fulfilled its duties to the citizens by keeping the Government, whose actions breached the constitution, in check.

In addition, the army’s presence on the streets was strengthened (and respect for it weakened) as the Government became increasingly reliant on the use of states of emergency and zones of special operation to suppress crime. (The judiciary would again rise to the occasion.) And, not for the first time, a retired general was appointed commissioner of police.

The war on crime, which “required urgent action on enforcement and corrections”, as Prime Minister Holness told the International Monetary Fund in 2018, was on in earnest. The G put in charge was none other than the unrelenting Rocky; his sidekick two-star Genna-Genna, Big Tony. Meanwhile, with extensive lobbying from Chung and his ilk in the private sector, the Government prepared to bring to Parliament a host of draconian legislation and “enhanced security measures” to “fight crime”.

Deeper structural and institutional issues, such as social and community development, modernisation of the JCF and better use of technology, were mentioned, but “shock and awe” was to be the preferred immediate approach to rid the society of what Bruce Golding, another evangelist, misguidedly calls “a cultural proclivity toward indiscipline and disorder”.

Elements of the media readily joined the assembly line as consent was manufactured under the supervision of the Lost Boys who rule Neverland, this island paradise. Soon, many of my friends started worshipping at Draco’s shrine, having come to believe what Apostle Chung had long taught that “the only way to help the ‘small’ man to start to feel some of the prosperity that some of those against doing what [was] necessary to create public order speak about” was by the imposition of discipline, law and order. Many, at the mercy of heartless killers and social murderers, had, like Hegelian slaves, become complicit in their own subjugation.

Those who were courageous enough to suggest that the resolution of social issues that contribute to crime could boost economic growth, that human rights were worth protecting, that permanently reducing crime required a broad-based strategy, and that shifting the composition of the security budget towards prevention could have significant returns in the long run, had their feeble voices drowned out by the din from the putrid echo chamber and were labelled “bleeding hearts” and panderers of criminals and adjudged to be enemies of the State.

Yet, some strong dissenting voices were raised. And heard. To its credit, His Majesty’s Loyal Opposition has often confronted the Government — its ideological soulmate and fellow traveller — about the pace of the journey on the road to authoritarianism, oligarchy and State capture. It is a journey that it, too, had embarked on before and most recently two decades ago when its prime minister had brought to Parliament amendments to the Defence Act which would grant police powers to the military.

The Opposition JLP at the time, headed by a man whose democratic and human rights credentials were subject to a great deal of doubt, including from his own partisans, argued that the Bill was rather vague and would grant soldiers powers they were not trained to handle. The Bar Association also rejected the proposed amendments, arguing that the proposal was dangerous and, if accepted, would lead to the increased militarisation of the society.

Late last year, the Gleaner had reason to scold Lt Gen Meade for statements he made about (temporarily) foregoing some rights in order to secure the right to life and for being critical of Jamaican citizens’ insistence on the promotion and protection of all their rights. In a leader, the newspaper argued forcefully that Gen Meade’s statements could be interpreted as support for a derogation from the norms of constitutional rule and the paramountcy of civil authority to which political rulers and the chief of defence staff himself adhered.

Well, here we are in 2022, the economy is in dire straits, people a suffa, murder is again on the rise after a steep fall in 2018 and a lull in 2020, the year of the pandemic, social unrest is on the rise, public servants are restless and Lt Gen Meade, a great and good soldier, with years of loyal and faithful service, was put forward to head the public service. Not everyone was surprised.

I fear what appears to be the emerging consensus on crime — the “shoot first and ask questions after” consensus. The “let them bleed out” approach, the suppression approach of far too many of our leaders, past and present. The law-and-order criminal approach (no paradox there) of the ruling oligarchs who have captured the State and have imposed a paramilitary approach to crime and violence. The captured State is the biggest gangster, with apologies to Saint Augustine.

Chief Justice Lensley Wolfe, a predecessor to Chief Justice Bryan Sykes, wrote in his 1993 Task Force on Crime Report: “No serious ongoing plan to deal with crime exists…but the crime problem cannot be properly addressed by crisis intervention. This approach addresses symptoms rather than root causes. Crime control is more about people than about a system. To control crime, the Government must become the facilitator in creating the conditions whereby humankind may be offered the opportunity of self-actualisation. The Government must begin to look at the educational structures, the social structures, eg, health care, housing, transportation, employment and see whether the existing structures are capable of creating the kind of human being for whom crime has no attraction. Until this approach is pursued, there will be task forces aplenty engaging themselves in the frustrating exercise of trying to cure the disease by treating the symptoms. It is people who matter.”

The continuing attempt to militarise our society, on the pretext of fighting crime, places us all at risk.

The price of liberty is eternal vigilance.

— Ambassador Emeritus Audley Rodriques, among other duties, served as Jamaica’s senior diplomat in Venezuela, Kuwait, and South Africa.