Wayne Chen, ContributorI READ DON Robotham's Struggles of the Jamaican People when I was 18 years old, upon its initial publication in the mid-1970s.
I was fascinated by Robotham's analysis of Jamaica's history and then current reality using the Marxist tool of dialectical materialism with its emphasis on the class struggle.
I also attended his lectures when I was a student at the University of the West Indies, and have continued to follow his writings since then.
While I have not necessarily agreed with all of his conclusions, I have always had, and continue to have, a deep respect for his commitment to social transform-ation and his genuine concern for the ordinary Jamaican.
MANAGEMENT'S RESPONSE
Nevertheless I see it fit to respond to many of the points he raised in his article published in The Sunday Gleaner of February 12, specifically those points referring to the 'Super Plus demonstrations'.
First, Robotham refers to the "vague and weak statements belatedly issued by the Super Plus management."
For the record, I issued a written release within a day of learning of the incident, that is, on January 18. Additionally, I was interviewed on two radio programmes the following day.
In both interviews, I condemned the incident and expressed "unconditional and unqualified" regret. I did so, despite not having all the facts of the case at hand, but knowing that had anything even remotely related to the alleged incident taken place, it would have been way outside our practice and policy.
MEDIA REPORTS
Second, Robotham repeatedly makes the point about public ire being raised by reports of the incident. We, as the management of Super Plus, and I, personally, fully understand and share their anger.
I am in no way seeking to justify the incident, but we should note that the media reports were highly sensational and, in several instances, inaccurate.
Also there was no second demonstration on February 8 as Robotham cites, even though this had been reported by at least one media house.
We accept that in a competitive media environment a story like this would be sensationalised, but as we strongly support freedom of the press, we accept this as an inevitable, if unfortunate, consequence.
RACE AND CLASS
Third, there are three discrete points to be made regarding the issues of, as Robotham puts it, the "arrogance of money, privilege, and race" and "race and class."
As it concerns race, it should be noted that the five accused -- my brother Jeremy Chen, the owner of the store, the store manager and assistant manager, a driver and a building contractor doing renovations at the store in question -- are all black Jamaicans.
Four of the five men were born into working-class homes. Where my brother Jeremy Chen may have been the one born into a middle class home, it should be noted that he is the grandson of black Jamaican domestic helpers and Chinese small shopkeepers, and his generation of my family is the first to attend any form of tertiary institution.
Further, on the specific question of the "arrogance of money," people who know my family well would describe us as humble, compassionate and deeply committed to developing our communities and the individual potential of the people in our midst.
CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE PARISH
To take as a microcosm of our general behaviour, in the parish of Manchester alone -- where 400 of the 2,200 Super Plus team members are employed -- in the past 18 months Super Plus has taken on the entire cost of repairing the homes of many of the team members employed by the branches in the parish, that were damaged by Hurricane Ivan, to the tune of several million dollars.
We contributed $100,000 towards repairing the roof of the New Hope Children's Home in Mandeville, as well as paid the insurance for their bus.
We donated $500,000 to the DeCarteret College PTA, towards purchasing a new school bus.
On Labour Day last year, Super Plus team leaders and members in the parish spearheaded a project to paint the entire Percy Junor Hospital, and were featured on the front page of the Gleaner of May 24, 2005.
FOOD, SCHOLARSHIPS
Over the same period, Super Plus has given over $530,000 to Holmwood Technical High School, the home of the Girl's Athletics champions and the all-island cricket champions.
We adopted the Comfort Hall Basic School in 1996 and continue to subsidise its operation.
We assisted the Christiana Moravian Primary School, which we adopted 15 years ago, with $460,000 to build a perimeter fence, and among other contributions, provide food for their breakfast programme.
We regularly provide food also for the Ridgemount United Church and Curphy Home feeding programmes. We provide scholarships and prizes to individuals and schools throughout the parish on an on-going basis.
We are particularly proud of the Super Plus/ Jamaica Association for Children with Learning Disabilities Reading Centre, which was established in Mandeville four years ago in response to a need in the parish for a centre to diagnose and help children with learning disabilities.
It was the first of its type in central Jamaica. Since then, we have spent over $4,000,000 to establish and subsidise the running costs of the centre, which has to date benefited several hundred children.
While I can itemise all of these, there are many, many smaller projects and individuals whom we assist in the parish by way of financial contribution or in kind as a regular part of our daily activities.
If Robotham has not heard of these, it is because we do them as a matter of course, and we do not have a marketing or public relations department to publicise these acts.
Robotham rightly points to the issue of class resentment as underlying the protest outside the courthouse.
Nevertheless, Robotham, in applying a traditional Marxian class perspective to the issue, does not take into consideration the valid argument that social class is a dynamic category, and that Jamaicans, particularly of this generation, have had access to tremendous opportunities for upward social mobility through education and hard work.
My own family can be seen as an example of this social mobility, but so can many of our team members, some of whom started working with us having no secondary much less tertiary qualifications, but who are today property owners, and whose children have gone to university.
They consider themselves solidly middle class. Many of these team members have themselves furthered their education, facilitated by Super Plus.
This episode has led us to a period of deep soul searching. We have reflected on the weaknesses in our structure that could have precipitated such an incident, particularly given that we have always held ourselves to a higher standard of behaviour than what obtains in most business organisations.
We have long recognised that maintaining a business culture based on our family's values of humility, mutual respect, compassion and continuous personal development would be difficult given the exponential increase in our staff complement over the past few years. We spend a great deal of time, money and attention on our team members' training and development. Indeed, the 13-week team leader training programme includes an entire module on conflict resolution, as well as other modules on personal development.
In the end, we feel a great sense of sadness over the incident, and we were chastened by the public response as manifested in the demonstration. I agree with Robotham that there is a strong sense of injustice in Jamaica, and being ever mindful of this, we are motivated to continue to strive to be the embodiment of a socially-conscious business organisation focused on human and community development.
Our disappointment has been tempered by the hundreds of messages of support from people who know us well, and know that this incident is a complete aberration. But in any case, our commitment to our mission of community service and people development remains undimmed, as does our larger goal of contributing to the overall develop-ment of our country.
Wayne Chen is CEO of the Super Plus supermarket chain.
