Admittedly, it’s irritating to persist in writing and commenting on the identical subject. Nonetheless, when the difficulty is as critical because the relentless violent crime wave in Jamaica, there’s a duty to revisit it.
It’s no secret that the Jamaican diaspora is extraordinarily involved with the repeated accounts of violent crime in Jamaica, and much more so with the obvious ineffectiveness of the incumbent authorities and regulation enforcement authorities to manage this surge. The scenario reached a crescendo with the information of a mass capturing close to 4 Paths, Clarendon, on Sunday night time. On that fateful night time, a gaggle of gunmen armed with high-powered rifles focused a neighborhood bingo social gathering, the place males, ladies, and youngsters had been current. When the capturing ended, eight people, together with a seven-year-old baby and several other ladies, had been useless, and others had been injured.
This marks a tragic new chapter in Jamaica. Whereas there have been frequent reviews of drive-by shootings which have claimed lives, by no means earlier than has there been a mass capturing of this scale by criminals. Paradoxically, these violent murders have occurred at a time when press releases from the Jamaican police have been reporting a decline in murders this yr. Nonetheless, the frequency of media reviews on violent gun crimes in Jamaica raises questions in regards to the validity of those claims.
In response to the mass capturing in Clarendon, Jamaica’s Prime Minister Andrew Holness condemned the shootings, as anticipated. He additionally acknowledged that the shootings had been organized by criminals exterior of Jamaica, in collaboration with inmates at present in Jamaican prisons. This raises an important query: If the prime minister and presumably Jamaican regulation enforcement authorities had been conscious of overseas and native collaboration in planning a significant crime in Jamaica, why had been no proactive measures taken to stop it and defend Jamaican residents?
There’s little proof of proactive measures being taken by the Jamaican authorities and regulation enforcement authorities to curb violent crime. Reactive measures, notably verbal outcries by public officers, are extra frequent, whereas criminals proceed to perpetrate gun violence throughout the nation.
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Monday morning, it was introduced that Holness had known as a gathering of Jamaica’s Nationwide Safety Council to deal with the Clarendon mass capturing. There was hope that this assembly would lead to rapid, aggressive measures to search out the perpetrators and deter additional gun violence. As a substitute, the announcement was product of curfews to be carried out within the area the place the mass capturing occurred and in different areas of Clarendon. The parishes of Clarendon, St. Catherine, Hanover, St. James, and Westmoreland have seen repeated incidents of violent shootings in latest months, and curfews and states of emergency in these parishes and elsewhere haven’t been efficient.
The prime minister additionally indicated that the federal government and regulation enforcement are conscious of the violent actions of varied gangs on the island and that sturdy actions can be taken to curb these actions. These gangs, and others which have just lately fashioned, have been wreaking havoc throughout the nation. The query stays: Why wasn’t the conflict on these gangs began sooner?
One thing could be very flawed with the incumbent authorities’s efforts to curb violent crime. The overwhelming majority of Jamaicans are dissatisfied with these efforts. Judging from a flood of social media posts in response to the mass capturing in Clarendon, there’s clear proof of this dissatisfaction. Persons are making quite a few strategies to quell gun violence, together with a nationwide ban on weapons, the return of the dying penalty for murderers, and stricter management at Jamaican ports to discourage the unlawful importation of firearms. However why are so many Jamaicans venting their frustrations and making their strategies on social media? Why are Jamaicans not organizing mass protests throughout the nation towards the federal government’s ineptitude in controlling violent crime?
Jamaica wants a daring, fearless chief who’s unconcerned with potential political backlash and prepared to steer an aggressive combat towards violent gangs and different criminals. This chief should eradicate the corruption reportedly current within the penal system, the place incarcerated criminals plan reprisals on rival gangs and enemies, take sturdy measures to cease the importation of weapons into Jamaica, remove corruption in public locations and amongst public officers, sort out the commerce and use of medicine like cocaine, and construction a formidable and efficient regulation enforcement power beneath sturdy, fearless management. Solely with such uncompromising management can an actual try be made to free Jamaica from the chains of violent crime.
Within the meantime, one can solely hope that there are members among the many rank and file of the nation’s regulation enforcement forces who’re brave, dedicated, and decided to hunt out and take away the criminals intent on damaging the lives of Jamaicans and the fame of Jamaica.
