Balford Henry, Senior Staff Reporter
THE difficulties of dealing with crime and violence in inner city communities where residents depend on political patronage for survival, highlighted last week's sittings of the West Kingston enquiry.
Dr. Henley Morgan of the Praise Tabernacle in South St. Andrew and the Rev. Rennard White of the Tower Hill Missionary Church in West Central St. Andrew, who made a joint submission to the Commission on the problems affecting the communities in which their churches existed, to the Commission, appeared Thursday to explain their positions. Both are also members of the National Committee on Crime.
Dr. Morgan, in addition to his pastoral duties, is also chairman of the Jamaica Constabulary Force's Service and Ethics Board, as well as a businessman and former chairman of the Jamaica Institute of Management (JIM). The Rev. White is also the president of the Jamaica Association of Evangelicals (JAE).
According to the two preachers, at the root of the indiscipline was the problem of unemployment which made residents of the areas dependent on political patronage which, in turn, drew them into a vicious cycle of political tribalism.
They also denounced discrimination against people from inner-city communities by employers.
Dr. Morgan suggested a partnership of politicians, pastors and the police to combat the problem. He also proposed affirmative action to correct the discrimination against inner-city job seekers.
The Rev. White noted that, "people have had to endure the indignity of borrowing someone else's address" from outside the community in order to get employment.
Dr. Morgan admitted that his home address has appeared on several resumes from his church community.
"I've always resisted it, because the hardest thing for me to accept is that in the country in which I live, you will have to change your address to get a job," Dr. Morgan said.
He said that the people of the inner city were, in fact, taking up educational opportunities at the same rate, or greater than people in well off areas, yet the returns to them were far less.
He suggested that the Government look at enacting Affirmative Action legislation to end the discrimination, if it is not ended voluntarily.
The Rev. White said that political tribalism was the basis of the violence in the country. He termed it, "the mother of all crime and violence in the society."
He said that it was political patronage which led to the tribalism and at the root of it was the need for employment in these communities.
He said he was not suggesting that the church should take the place of the Government, but that it works in seeing to a fairer distribution of work which does not turn the beneficiaries into puppets.
In the communities a kind of alternative leadership has evolved, he said, which was invariably coming out of the political system and is attached to, or supportive of, a political party. They retain that connection and, when the right time comes, use their influence in that way.
Both churchmen, however, agreed that the church was failing in terms of reaching the young men in these communities.
The Rev. White said that one of the challenges, even in his own church and among other pastors, was how to reach the young men, before they are gone that far.
"We would really like preservation before reclamation, so we work really hard at the Sunday school level, but some do get away," he said. Dr. Morgan, who was more explicit, explained that in his Sunday school there were equal numbers of boys and girls until they reach nine years old, the boys begin to disappear.
"Somewhere between nine and 13 they don't like to be in collective kinds of activities, they don't like to be in groupings, they resist socialising," he said.
He said that he had learnt recently in Trench Town, that there was an actual induction programme, in which young boys are carried through stages, starting with linking up to a gunman they admire, being allowed to touch, then carry his gun, "after that the boy will sleep under your house and will kill for you," he said.
Asked what do parents do when the drift starts, Dr. Morgan said that the fact was that the mothers were unable to cope.
"Women don't like me to say this, but the truth of the matter is that women can't be fathers. They can be anything else, but they cannot be fathers (especially) when you are going out working from morning 'til night and trying to work your brain on how to support a family on $1,500 per week."
He said that parenting was an absolutely critical issue and an increasing problem was the lack of parental support from so-called "godfathers" in the communities.
He said that another problem was the lack of "godfathers."
"You have some sections of the community where the more seasoned community leaders, I use the term euphemistically, are elsewhere and their replacement are younger people who don't think twice about liquidating you. Nobody can talk to them," he said.
He said that the older community leaders, those reaching say 35 and want to live longer or have some commitments, are more reasonable. But, there were whole streets with no leadership.
He suggested a partnership between politicians, pastors and the police to deal with the situation.
