Boyne
Ian Boyne, Contributor
THE GOVERNMENT has scored a major tactical victory over the criminal network in the early phase of its anti-crime initiative with its announcement of a set of strategies which incorporate the positions of all the combatants in the crime debate.
The Government has, effectively, disarmed the human rights lobby by including its three most vocal and media-friendly spokespersons on the two critical bodes it has set up to monitor the Jamaica Defence Force (JDF) and to advise the Ministry of National Security on crucial crime-fighting issues.
The Executive Director of Jamaicans for Justice (JFJ), Dr. Carolyn Gomes, ubiquitous talk show guest; JFJ chairperson Susan Goffe, a regular voice on the electronic media, Breakfast Club member and sometime co-host; Dr. Lloyd Barnett, the highly respected constitutional lawyer and chairman of the Independent Jamaica Council for Human Rights (JCHR), now have an official platform in the corridors of power to champion their human rights causes.
Even the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP), which is often quarrelsome and cantankerous on national security issues, gave cautious support to the Government initiatives, with National Security spokesman Derrick Smith making the significant point that "in all fairness" for the first time, the Government had adopted an integrated approach involving the legislative, policing and socio-economic aspects of crime-fighting.
The Government's latest anti-crime initiatives represent the triumph of civil society, including the human rights lobby, as well as the triumph of good governance in that the Government displayed the humility and responsiveness to public pressure to adopt a comprehensive approach to crime-fighting.
The latest set of initiatives mirror the consensus which has emerged in the society on dealing with both the severity and the complexity of the crime problem.
SETTING THE TONE
The Government has clearly rejected the myopic, either-or positions which are simplistically put forward in the crime debate. Wisely, the Government has not simply given a knee-jerk, panic reaction to the escalating violence and disorder in the society by imposing a State of Emergency, or just pushing for hard policing strategies.
Nor has it seen only socio-economic renewal of the inner cities as the way to deal with growing criminal threat.
Significantly, too, the Government has set up the mechanisms to protect the human rights of citizens, while rejecting the position of the human rights fundamentalists who are so obsessed with human rights as a philosophical absolute that they minimise the need to adopt tough and resolute measures to deal with the threat to the Jamaican state posed by a ruthless band of criminals and terrorists.
The Prime Minister himself set the tone for this balanced, comprehensive, integrated approach to tackling the criminal challenge in his address to the nation last week Sunday night.
"Better and more effective policing is clearly an important part of the solution. But that is not all. That cannot be all," the Prime Minister said emphatically, echoing the human rights activists and other enlightened citizens who have been rightly challenging those who believe that all that is necessary is to get some "bad boy police" to kill off the criminals.
The Prime Minister made an important admission in that national broadcast: "Conditions of poverty, social deprivation, political alienation, victimisation in any form, political tribalism and general inner-city neglect and decay, as well as pervasive negative values and attitudes, all contribute to the crisis."
And as though that were not enough to underscore the fact that he is taking a wholistic approach to crime-fighting, which is being increasingly called for, the Prime Minister cemented that commitment rhetorically when he declared that the social and economic projects would be "addressed with the same intensity and vigour with which the security matters will be pursued."
What the Prime Minister has done, and this was most eloquently and adroitly complemented by National Security Minister when he spoke to Parliament on Tuesday, is to unite the society around a set of commonly agreed-on strategies and to effectively isolate the criminal elements who have been helped unwittingly by the fact that we as a civil society was busy tearing ourselves apart, engaging in polemical blood-letting and diffusing our energy in useless, silly either-or debates while they were uniting across political party lines to reign terror on us.
The Government, by conceding to all the factions in the society, including those who want the tough resolute, hard policing methods, has robbed the criminal network of a major weapon (our disunity), in their war against the Jamaican state.
The media now don't have to fill their newscasts and news pages with statements from the human rights groups making charges about human rights abuses and attacking the Government's unbalanced, one-sided approach to crime fighting. They have been given a voice on the inside and they can have an impact in halls of power.
Those of us who want the criminals to be sent a clear message and for them to know this Government will bring the fight to them and will not be fooling around with them, have received just that sort of tough-talking, no-nonsense posture from both the Prime Minister and the National Security Minister.
The church and progressive organisations which see that unless the moral-cultural and socio-economic conditions are dealt with urgently, we are fighting a losing battle, have also had their concerns addressed.
It would be hard to assemble a more impressive and wide-ranging group than the one which constitutes the Consultative Committee on the National Security Crime Plan.
Now that we are united and have the mechanisms in place to address our various concerns, we can really get on with the task of isolating the criminals, and supporting our security forces in tracking and cracking them.The media, happily, seem to be coming on board in bolstering this unity, the way the United States press rallied together in support of their nation after September 11, 2001. That prominent photograph on the front page of The Gleaner on Tuesday with a soldier compassionately walking a little child across the street in an inner-city area was an absolute delight.
SENDING POSITIVE SIGNALS
It sent a positive signal to the society; it made people feel good about the security forces; This is how the media can be used to build up the society's support for the security forces and to reduce the tensions between civilians and the security forces.
On Monday evening Cliff Hughes' Nationwide radio show had a clip from a woman in Hannah Town saying how much she appreciated the presence of the security forces and how she felt safer now that they were there.
Journalists like to hide behind the cloak of objective, dispassionate reporting and they display profound philosophical naivety by giving the impression they don't make choices choices which reflect biases and points of view. An editor can choose to put two photos with soldiers roughing up ghetto youth on the front page, sending a certain message and reinforcing a certain negative image of the security forces.
Or the editor can do what the Gleaner did on Tuesday. Both things do happen in the inner city. What we choose to highlight represents judgment, choice, and not some pre-ordained "objective" fact.
Nationwide wouldn't have to try hard to find enough voices expressing reservations or disgust with the presence of the military and the police. The editors appropriately gave us the other side. Our unity is a major threat to the criminal network.Also, because the Government wisely did not go into Tivoli Gardens but tackled two major PNP garrisons first (in addition to Mr. Seaga's Denham Town), it gave credibility to the initiatives.
Peter Phillips' clear statement that criminals who wear the PNP label would receive no protection and that those of the JLP stripe would not be harassed with any greater intensity was welcome. We will be watching closely to see that his words are put into action.
CRITICAL ELEMENTS
OF THE PLAN
The new crime initiatives have all the critical elements which frequently come up in discussions on the issue, including the strengthening of intelligence-gathering capabilities; international collaboration, including assistance from the legendary Scotland Yard of Britain; greater equipping of the force in terms of vehicles and training; greater attention to our ports and, very importantly, legislative changes to make the justice system more effective and to throw the criminals behind bars with greater dispatch.
I have never understood the great passion for capital punishment when so few of our criminals are ever caught. Capital punishment is no deterrent to crime when people in Jamaica know they can kill with impunity and and in the clear sight of people because they know people are afraid to testify against them.
Focus on being able to catch more criminals and make it difficult for people to kill and get away with it, and that will be a greater deterrent than simply hanging he criminals who are already on death row.
Some of these hardened criminals and dons who are responsible for multiple murders know that, in some cases, if they are even caught they will soon be released for "lack of evidence", and that they can afford the highest priced lawyers in Kingston. There must be an effective plan to keep these fellows off the street.
Intelligence-gathering will be most critical in this anti-crime plan. It is literally ridiculous to see soldiers excavating some old house in the inner city, looking randomly for guns. If that is how they are going to spend their time, they might as well go back to Up Park Camp to play dominoes and watch television.
They must know where they are going; who the dons and gangsters are and get them. Many of them are not in the inner city. Their corrupt contacts in the security forces already told them what was going down and many, no doubt, moved their "things" already. Some fryers are left back, but they are not the only ones you want.
I hear that in Payne Land on Monday morning when the operation started, there were more boys in khaki uniforms than ever. The security forces felt good that so many ghetto youth were going to school.
The "schoolers" had their "school bags", too going to school outside the community. It was after many left that the security forces realised that these were mainly gunmen with their arms properly disguised, taking cover outside their communities!
The good thing about this latest set of initiatives is that there is no timetable attached to the military/police presence. It is important that the minister made it clear that the operation would be island-wide.
The hard policing aspect needs to be tight, clinical and effective. Get the intelligence and know who you are going after, rather than wasting time and unnecessarily inconveniencing decent, law-abiding citizens.
As Don Robotham warned some weeks ago, the criminal network will seek to exploit sentiments and use the media and elements in civil society to cry out about the violation of human rights, of "fighting down poor, black people", and of using the state and "Babylon" to "trample on the hard-fought rights of the poor."
The Government has already taken the wind out of their sails by appointing the Independent Review Panel and the National Consultative Committee.
Let's us work through these mechanisms to redress genuine abuses while we are not allowing ourselves to be sidetracked and hoodwinked.
