THE EDITOR, Sir:I WOULD like to commend the Government of Jamaica for its imposition of visa restrictions on persons travelling from The Cayman Islands to Jamaica. Indeed, I would wish for our Government to go further and impose similar restrictions on Bermuda and those other Caribbean countries that have imposed similar restrictions on our people in recent times.
I have noticed comments in the press by readers who have taken the Government to task on its action. They comment that these islands are wealthier than we are and that Jamaica stands to lose far more than these countries do.
It is imperative that Jamaica maintains the integrity of its sovereignty especially in this visa affair. Countries like Bermuda and The Cayman Islands remain appendages of colonial England, neither politically nor economically independent. For all their financial prosperity, they remain relics of a colonial past that some Jamaicans like myself are not interested in. Many argue with justification that Jamaica has done an awful job in managing its economic and social affairs. But that is hardly justification for every two-bit banana republic hanging on to the coat-tails of Mother England to insult our sovereignty.
Those Jamaicans who chose to travel to and/or work in The Cayman Islands or Bermuda will know that they will be held to similar levels of responsibility and accountability as they are in England or the United States of America. As in those jurisdictions, the system will flush out the criminals which are as unwelcome here as they are there. The injustice of it all, however, is that these countries keep our best and deport our worst.
The Caymanians and Bermu-dans are quite welcome to retain their umbilical ties to the former slave masters. In spite of our problems with crime and violence and a flagging economy, some of us still hope for a better day. At the end of it all, independence begins in the mind and for better or worse, we are charting our own destiny while our Caymanian and Bermudan cousins continue to have theirs chartered from 10 Downing Street in London.
I am etc.,
HOPETON MORRISON
117 Ensom Acres
Spanish Town P.O., St. Catherine
