The madness of government bureaucracy in Jamaica is not a simple irritation. Malignant bureaucracy is an enormous structural millstone around our necks that has made Jamaica poorer, weaker, and less respected.

Administrative timidity, with its by-product of decision fatigue, is not a virtue. It is a vice — a very expensive one, especially for a developing economy. Decision fatigue inevitably leads to expensive errors which, over time, whittle away at national agency. What is the result of this paralysis? The lives and livelihoods of ordinary Jamaicans, especially, are made harder and more hellish.

There are some among us who fervently believe that Jamaicans are a barbarous, benighted, and depraved set of people. I don’t buy into this self-sabotage. This type of self-hate is a vestige of slavery and colonialism. Based on this relic, and related relics, misleaders — as well as some well-meaning authorities — have, over decades, institutionalised obstacles under the guise of checks and balances. These are not guard rails or safeguards. The consequences have been borne by regular Jamaicans.

GAME SHOW POLITICS

For many years Jamaica has been governed reactively, not strategically. Uninformed social and economic policies were the order of the day. The main theme in politics then was spectacle. Many elected and selected leaders were great at whipping up rage, but woefully deficient when it came to providing good governance.

Some among us who hanker after high and low public office have yet to evolve from that damaging phase. Today, they are desperately trying to sell us a form of politics rooted in influencer culture. For them, politics is a game show. For us, it is our lives and livelihoods.

Government (including the Opposition) exists to leave something better than they inherited for especially the majority. Jamaica has squandered many of the post-Independence years on various wasteful experiments and severely costly distractions. It was not until recent years — specifically 2010 — that Jamaica’s indebtedness, for example, came home to roost and began to suffocate every area of public service and daily life. I previously discussed this matter in great detail here.

Except for those who suffer from political amnesia and related ailments, honest folks remember that by 2013 Jamaica’s public debt had reached a historic high of about 147 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP), making it one of the most-indebted countries in the world, according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF). We were therefore forced to start thinking and behaving reasonably after decades of foolishness and irrationality.

We were forced to fast-track the economic recovery programme started by Prime Minister Bruce Golding and Finance and Public Service Minister Audley Shaw in 2010.

Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller and Minister of Finance and the Public Service Dr Peter Phillips were faithful to the implementation of the economic recovery programme, albeit under the watchful eye of the IMF. The Administration of Prime Minister Andrew Holness — first with Dr Nigel Clarke and now with Fayval Williams as the minister of finance and public service — is working hard to prevent a repeat of past mistakes.

It was decades of foolishness and irrationality which plunged Jamaican into the pit of choking debt. Foolery and irrationality by those who are entrusted with the privilege to govern are costly especially for Jamaica’s have-nots. Jamaica has hundreds of have-nots. Some in our parliament today evidently do not understand this biting reality.

“Foolery, Sir, does walk about the orb like the sun; it shines everywhere,” Shakespeare famously wrote in
Twelfth Night. This means that foolishness, defined as behaviour lacking good judgement or wisdom, is indeed widespread and often celebrated. This great madness stifles development.

Two Sundays ago, I said in my The Agenda column, “Some in the Administration have allowed themselves to be sucked into the Opposition People’s National Party’s (PNP) tactic of the ‘Jerry Springernisation’ of Gordon House.” I stand by that. The politicians in Gordon House had better understand that the increased and biting hardships in the country, exacerbated by the passage of Hurricane Melissa and the ongoing conflict in the Middle East that has triggered a global oil crisis, are not a game show for ordinary Jamaicans. Folks are not enamoured by the noises of the court jesters.

WATCH THE SALE!

“Don’t watch the noise in the market, watch the sale” (or results) is a philosophy urging focus on long-term goals and tangible outcomes, rather than short-term volatility, emotions, or opinions. It encourages ignoring distractions to achieve success.

Ordinary Jamaicans are interested in material results which better our lives and livelihoods, not malignant bureaucracy. Consider this: ‘Millions unspent, Auditor General flags slow use of hurricane donations’. The Jamaica Observer item of May 13, 2026 said, among things: “After receiving $1.44 billion in donations by February 23, 2026 to assist Jamaicans devastated by Hurricane Melissa, the Office of Disaster Preparedness and Emergency Management (ODPEM) had spent just $26.2 million, or 1.8 per cent, of the funds, by that date, according to an Auditor General’s Department report tabled in Parliament on Tuesday.

“The real-time audit of the Hurricane Melissa Relief Initiative, which examined financial management and procurement under the Government’s Roof Restoration Programme, also found that $34 million worth of roofing materials could not be properly verified because the supplies had not been supported by signed delivery slips or goods received notes (GRNs), while a further $141.1 million in committed expenditure lacked confirmed payment documentation.

“The report painted a troubling picture of Jamaica’s disaster recovery framework almost four months after Hurricane Melissa, which battered sections of the island on October 28, 2025. It exposed weaknesses in financial oversight, procurement monitoring, governance systems, and beneficiary verification within the country’s relief response.”

Seven months after one of the most powerful hurricanes in recorded history landed on our shores, scores of Jamaicans still have tarpaulins on their roofs. Some are still without electricity and water, some are yet to get back their jobs, and dozens are still picking up the pieces. In the midst of this great social and economic dislocation and displacement, malignant bureaucracy is evidently ruling the roost. Why then do we have legislators?

Each year the people of this country are told that millions of dollars earmarked for use on behalf of the people are returned to the Ministry of Finance and the Public Service, yet some of our major roads are riddled with craters. Folks are sick to the hilt of having to wait for extended hours at health facilities all over the country because of shortages of equipment and sometimes personnel, yet we are told that there is no shortage of cash to remedy these problems. I could multiply examples.

For donkey’s years we have been hearing that a great beast called Byzantine bureaucracy and its companion monster, procurement, are the bane of our existence. Why then do we have legislators?

Folks are no longer interested in this dodge. We need practical results which can be felt in our pockets and which are visible on our dinner tables.

After 64 years of Independence, if we cannot organise ourselves to tame malignant bureaucracy, then we are nothing more than intellectual pygmies who also suffer from extreme lethargy. If this is our condition we might as well lock up shop and call the colonials to take back Jamaica. It’s that simple.

WHY DO WE HAVE GOVERNMENT?

Thomas Jefferson, one of America’s founding fathers and principal author of the Declaration of Independence in 1776, has provided, in my estimation, one of the best definitions of Government to date.

In a letter to the citizens of Washington County in 1809, Jefferson said: “The care of human life, happiness, and not their destruction, is the first and only legitimate object of good Government.”

Some in our Parliament do not understand this great purpose. We are not a serious nation and do not deserve to remain independent if governing is reduced to social media gimmickry. Some in Parliament seem not to understand that facts, when properly arranged and presented succinctly, are sharper than razors. Too many have absolutely no ground game. They fail to grasp that presence is transmitted through keen signals and atmosphere, not buffoonery. Parliament has far too many who lack sufficient command of the essentials. This is a big part of Jamaica’s predicament at this time.

A toxic mix of obvious unpreparedness to manage Jamaica’s affairs and a profound misunderstanding of the true purpose of Government — by some of the elected and selected members in Gordon House — was on full display in the Jerry Springer-style theatrics that some on the Opposition benches brought to the recent debate on the National Reconstruction and Resilience Authority (NaRRA).

To me, the imbecilic behaviour of the Opposition was the political equivalent of the PNP throwing yet another hand grenade at Jamaicans. In recent times, the PNP has placed great obstacles — including law-fare — in the path of policies and programmes that benefit the majority of Jamaicans. Recall they mounted massive opposition to the national identification system (NIDS) and angrily fought against the states of public emergency (SOEs) precisely when its success was becoming evident.

As I see it, the PNP doesn’t only need a new leader, it urgently needs a new direction. A degree is not needed to realise that NaRRA’s success is Jamaica’s.

IMMINENT LEADERSHIP BATTLE

This brings me to the upcoming leadership contest in the PNP. Some members are already openly auditioning for the imminent leadership battle. Some weeks ago I said in my The Agenda piece: “General Secretary of the PNP Dr Dayton Campbell; Julian Robinson, spokesperson on finance; and health spokesperson Dr Alfred Dawes are dark horses. If Lisa Hanna returns to what she once described as “blood sport”, she will be a formidable contestant. If she contests, there will likely be a photo finish between her and Crawford, I forecast.”

I am sticking with that prediction.

Can any of the likely contenders usher in the urgently needed change of direction that Norman Manley’s party requires? Time will tell.

By the way, a reader of mine said I should stop referring to the PNP as Norman Manley’s party because the founder of the PNP is, in fact, the largely unsung Osmond Theodore Fairclough — a Calabar High School graduate and socialist thinker from Bethel Town, Westmoreland. Fairclough was the first general secretary of the PNP.

Going forward I will yield to the reader’s request based on the evidence.

It was the famed economist John Maynard Keynes who famously asked: “When the facts change, I change my mind — what do you do, Sir?” That is the hallmark of a rational mind. I try to be rational.

Incidentally, another of my readers said Mark Golding will retain his job “if and when”.

I am sticking with my forecast that Golding will not cross the finish line first in the upcoming leadership battle.

His leadership is antithetical to good governance.

GOVERN!

‘Dare we watch Nightmare 2.0,’ was the title of my column on September 28, 2025. In it I said, among other things: “I am no clairvoyant, but I forecast that the Mark Golding-led Opposition PNP will continue to be obstructionist. There will be frequent walk-outs in Parliament and related orchestrated delays, disruptions, and distractions, I forecast.”

I have been proved right.

Overt and camouflaged obstructions will not help the PNP — or Jamaica — recover stronger or faster.

Jamaica is no longer “PNP country”, and the PNP is no longer the party of natural choice. The PNP’s base has dwindled because of a significant decline in class consciousness and ideological loyalty, among other factors.

Some at the higher echelons of the PNP — and even at the lower rungs too — continue to claim that whenever the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) is in office, the PNP is still in power, despite their party’s three-consecutive general election defeats and two-successive local government election defeats.

The ruling JLP must govern so effectively that all reasonable Jamaicans abandon the notion that the PNP remains in power even when the JLP is in office.

Garfield Higgins is an educator and journalist. Send comments to the Jamaica Observer or higgins160@yahoo.com.

Garfield Higgins

Prime Minister Dr Andrew Holness must lead his Administration decidedly to achieve the post-Independence success regular Jamaicans require. Garfield Robinson

Opposition Leader Mark Golding knocks the Government’s provisions under its Restoration of Owner or Occupant Family Shelter (ROOFS) programme in Parliament recently. Photo: Karl Mclarty