Edward SeagaI WOULD never have questioned the professionalism of the Jamaica Defence Force until about 10 years ago. Up to that time, the JDF was still the Jamaican organisation in which I reposed the greatest confidence to carry out its duties with integrity. I had over the years until then, said on many occasions publicly, that while this was so, Jamaicans should have no fear that our democratic
system of Government would be displaced unconstitutionally for a non-democratic one.
I recognise that even with a democratic system, perversion and subversion are possible. The fraudulent practices which perverted the Jamaican electoral system from its inception tell us that the presence of a democratic form of government is not all that there is to democracy because within this system many gross abuses can occur. But a new electoral system has now been introduced to deal with most of the corrupt operations of the past. This would not have been possible if democracy, as a system of governance, had been replaced unconstitutionally. So while a JDF of integrity upholds the constitution of Jamaica, we should have no fear.
But is the JDF upholding the constitution now?
Is it killing innocent people wilfully?
Is it, therefore, taking life unconstitutionally?
Is it inflicting brutal and inhuman punishment on people?
Examples of the occurrence of these extra-constitutional acts are legion but I will stick to the ones I know best, the occurrences in west Kingston over the past 10 years.
During the mid 1990s, the Denham Town community was under daily attacks from men in Rema who shot and killed people, burnt and pillaged houses,
causing 700 long-time residents of Water Street and Little King Street, in particular, to flee from the area. The role of the JDF was to move around in 'rat patrols' (open jeeps) ostensibly to offer protection to the residents from the attackers and vandals. However, these 'rat patrols' became even greater objects of fear as they exercised their
authority indiscriminately, shooting at random, wounding people and even wilfully killing dogs.
The event that most vividly comes to mind is the occasion when, during a patrol on Oxford Street with a well-known district constable from the PNP bastion in Matthews Lane as their police consort, the patrol could find no boys or men on the street to pounce on as by then, the rat patrols were so feared that people, and males in particular, ran on first sighting. One teenager stood at his gate, naïvely watching the approaching patrol vehicle. I say naïvely because the boy was a devoted Christian and Sunday School habitué, not accustomed to the 'runnings' of violence and crime. The patrol stopped beside him and two soldiers jumped out of the jeep and held him, throwing him into the back of the vehicle. As they were driving off, his mother screamed in tears, begging the soldiers to release him. "Don't worry, Mammy, we soon bring him back," one soldier replied. The boy was taken to Rema and released, where men from the area stabbed him and, while still alive, set him on fire.
This incident left the community in shock and awe.
Perhaps this was only a practice session for what was to come.
MAY 6-8, 1997
A teacher from the then Tivoli Gardens Comprehensive High School, reported to me that she witnessed a V-150 armoured
personnel carrier known as a tanker drive into Tivoli Gardens at 3:00 p.m. on May 6, 1997. She recounted that the tanker immediately opened fire in an arbitrary fashion for a short period. The tanker then left Tivoli and drove to the Denham Town Police Station, a distance of 300 yards. Judging from the sounds, she said, only one calibre of ammunition was fired. At 5:30 p.m., the V-150 returned, followed by a large number of police and soldiers who swarmed the community, firing at random in all directions. This action was sustained throughout the afternoon. Several residents reported that small teams of soldiers roamed the community, firing shots aimlessly into buildings and in the air, giving the impression to those on the outside that a 'war' was in progress, with two sides exchanging shots. This is how it was reported in the media.
Media people were too fearful
and intimidated to see for
themselves. This was also the official report.
A military analyst contacted in the United States to whom a copy of a recording of the
barrage of gunfire was sent, analysed from the sound of
gunfire that the guns used were:
General purpose machine guns used on the V-150;
SLRs;
L85 rifles for long range, with telescopes;
M16s.
These weapons are used by the JDF.
This activity continued for the next two days, May 7 and 8, accompanied by official reports that the security forces were engaged in shoot-outs with gunmen.
According to the Minister of National Security, the purpose of the invasion was to recover guns and apprehend gunmen. On the ground, Superintendent Bailey, in charge of the operation, stated at one time, that the purpose was to remove roadblocks, and at another, to pursue a rumour that there was planned retaliation for the extra-judicial slaying by the police of a man the week before.
The outcome was that after three days in which 2,000 rounds of ammunition were fired:
Not one gunman;
Not one round of ammunition;
Not one gun;
Not even one spent shell was recovered.
But there were other casualties:
1. A six-year-old boy, jumping in his bed beside a louvre window along with two other children, playing and laughing, suddenly fell on the bed with blood
gushing from his head. Part of his brain was splattered on the ground. He died instantly. Looking through the bullet hole in the louvre, a small unit of
soldiers were seen in position on a second-floor balcony of the Tivoli Gardens High School which had been commandeered by the JDF as a base. The
balcony and the room of the child were on the same level second floor and in clear line of sight of each other with no
intervening building.
2. The next morning, a middle-age woman was returning across from the Tivoli Garden Square where she went to buy some salt and other provisions for breakfast. She was shot by soldiers stationed at the school who were the only ones in a line of sight. The distance was about 50 yards from which point it was easy to identify that the victim was a woman. A soldier deliberately lined up this woman in the sight of his gun and squeezed the trigger knowing that he was launching a missile of death. When her son ran to help her after seeing her collapse on the ground, he too came under fire and had to withdraw, leaving his mother to die. She left
four children.
3. In a second-storey wooden house at the corner of Beeston Street and Regent Street, another middle-age woman was changing her clothes having just returned from a funeral. As she walked around her bed, a bullet tore away much of her skull, killing her instantly. The bullet hole in the wooden wall of her room inside the house, when lined up with the hole of the same bullet passing through the wall of the room at the front of the house, created a line of sight to the roof of an apartment building in Tivoli Courts nearby where soldiers were seen in position. She left four children.
4. That same afternoon, another middle-age woman returning to her apartment after the same funeral, was fired on by a soldier from the military command centre in a three-storey building in Coronation Market, which was in clear line of sight. The first bullet missed, hitting a concrete washing tub nearby. She turned to run, but the mother of six children never made it to safety. She was fatally cut down by the next bullet.
There were several instances of wounding in the three-day ordeal of terror, all from random shooting, including a teenage girl, a young boy and a man with one leg, in a rum shop.
A JDF helicopter sprayed
bullets from above during this three-day period, as witnessed by several outsiders. But, worse was yet to come.
Part II Next week. Edward Seaga is a former prime minister. He is now a Distinguished Fellow at the University of the West Indies. Email: odf@uwimona.edu.jm
