Omar Anderson, Gleaner Writer
Opposition Leader Bruce Golding (right) speaks with Earl Samuels, president of the Rotary Club of St. Andrew, during the club's weekly luncheon meeting held at Jamaica Pegasus Hotel in New Kingston yesterday. - RUDOLPH BROWN/CHIEF PHOTOGRAPHER
OPPOSITION LEADER Bruce Golding yesterday appealed for the implementation of crime recommendations to dismantle garrisons and reshape politics in these communities.
Mr. Golding, who in 1995 denounced garrison politics while establishing the National Democratic Movement (NDM), said the country is being faced with a "huge implementation deficit".
Speaking ahead of the bi-partisan crime summit at Jamaica House later this month, the West Kingston Member of Parliament cited the recommendations of several crime committees since 1970, including those chaired by Chief Justice Lensley Wolfe and former Political Ombudsman, Justice James Kerr.
"I believe it is going to be imperative for us to address in a frontal way, the question of garrison politics and the specific recommendations made by the Kerr and Wolfe Committees, as to how garrison politics ought to be transformed and dismantled, and how we need to reshape the politics that exists in these communities," he said.
The JLP Leader was speaking at the Rotary Club of St. Andrew 's weekly luncheon at the Jamaica Pegasus Hotel, New Kingston.
Mr. Golding's comments came more than two years after rejoining the JLP, the party he had left to form the NDM.
On April 13 this year, Mr. Golding was overwhelmingly elected to represent West Kingston, a garrison constituency, following the resignation of former MP Edward Seaga.
Yesterday, the Opposition Leader said the country must be decisive in its fight against dons attempting to control communities.
"We must be prepared to examine them (recommendations) and take firm decisions and implement them, so that what constitutes an hindrance to the effective policing of these communities and the establishment of effective relationship between these communities and the police, that we can get beyond that," Mr. Golding proposed.
