Dear Editor,

The following is an open letter to Daryl Vaz, minister of transport and mining:

I write to you not as a critic, but as a Jamaican student who believes in the power of good governance to correct this course with grace.

I am a student at The University of the West Indies, Mona Campus, and this letter carries two requests that I believe you have the authority, and the opportunity, to act on in ways that will be remembered long after the current headlines have faded.

1) Donate five surplus buses to UWI Mona as a campus safety shuttle:

By now every Jamaican who reads a newspaper knows the story of the rural school bus programme. One hundred and ten used buses were purchased from the US for approximately $1.4 billion. There were questions about the procurement process; Opposition calls for investigation; reports of mechanical problems and unexpected shutdowns on rural routes; and lower-than-expected student uptake — not, as some officials suggested, because students prefer buses playing lewd music, but because, as veteran principals have said plainly, the routes do not reach the interior communities where many students actually live.

Minister, you announced in February that Phase 2 of the programme will involve 100 brand-new buses in the next fiscal year, effectively retiring the current used fleet from rural highway service. That is the right call. But it raises a practical question: What happens to the buses that remain?

I am asking you to donate five of those surplus buses to The University of the West Indies, Mona Campus, to operate as a dedicated late-night safety shuttle service on campus.

UWI Mona is home to thousands of students who move between lecture halls, the library, halls of residence, and campus gates late into the night. For years, the absence of a structured campus shuttle has been a security gap that falls hardest on women and students in more isolated parts of the compound. A late-night shuttle loop, running from approximately 8:00 pm to 2:00 am, would directly address that gap.

And here is what makes this proposal uniquely suited to these particular buses: These vehicles which struggled with the terrain of Westmoreland and St Elizabeth would face none of those demands on the UWI compound.

I also note, Minister, that you highlighted with some pride the cameras fitted on these buses — cameras that helped police investigate an accident quickly. Those same cameras, still in place, would become an asset for campus security from day one, at no additional cost.

Thousands of students safer every night and a Government of Jamaica narrative that shifts from controversy to genuine, visible care for young people. That is a legacy worth claiming.

2) Remove Custom duties on school electronics from September to October 2026

Hurricane Melissa devastated communities across this island and families were set back financially in ways that are still being felt months later. Thousands of students are households still recovering. Many families who would ordinarily stretch to buy a child a laptop or tablet for school will simply not be able to afford it.

I am asking you, Minister, to champion a temporary suspension of Custom duties on school electronics — laptops, tablets, e-readers, and similar educational devices — for the period of September 2026 to October 2026.

A laptop is no longer a luxury for a Jamaican student — it is a necessity. Distance learning during COVID showed us that. The proliferation of online resources, digital assignments, and e-learning platforms since then has only deepened that reality. Yet the cost of a basic educational device, once import duties are applied, puts it beyond the reach of many working-class families in the best of times.

A targeted, time-limited duty suspension would not hollow out government revenue. The economic activity it stimulates — in electronics retail, importation, and distribution — would itself generate value.

Other governments in our region have used exactly this kind of targeted, time-limited relief to ease the burden on households after natural disasters.

Minister, education is the one investments that no storm can wash away. Please do not let the cost of a laptop be what stands between a student and the tools needed.

I raise these two requests in public because I believe public conversation is how good ideas find their way to action. I welcome any dialogue on either proposal.

Shaquille Ramsay

shaquilleramsay@gmail.com