IN COMPARISON with Jamaica, the Eastern Caribbean in general and Trinidad in particular often seem more pragmatic in finding solutions for their problems and more imaginative in implementing them. Once a reality has been identified, our Caribbean neighbours are more aggressive in taking steps to deal with it. News that Trinidad, in an effort to cope with its rising crime rate, has recruited 40 British policemen as part of its constabulary force is a case in point. With a much bigger population and a higher murder rate Jamaica has recruited three expatriate police officers and this could well be a case of too little, too late.
While Jamaica debates wire-tapping, Trinidad may be ahead of us in using aerial surveillance to track drug traffickers and other illegal activities. News has leaked that the twin-island republic has invested in a blimp, equipped with highly sophisticated listening devices, which will be permanently anchored in the skies over Port-Of-Spain.
At a public auction where the bidding is progressing by small increments it is sometimes good strategy for one person in the contest to make a dramatic increase in the bid price. This has a shock value and, as a grand gesture, is often effective in overcoming an opponent. The one-shot recruitment of 40 Scotland Yard detectives by Trinidad could well be the kind of pre-emptive strike which will intimidate and demoralise that country's criminal gangs.
St. Lucia is the smallest island in the world to have produced two Nobel laureates - Sir Arthur Lewis in economics and Derrick Walcott in literature, reflecting a culture in which imagination is key. Is Jamaica suffering from an imagination deficit in dealing with our problems or is it simply a matter of being so constrained by our current economic plight that we have been stunned into inaction, trying to make words substitute for deeds?
The times in which we live require bold, imaginative steps in dealing with crime, the economy, education and our myriad social problems. It is not beyond us to find creative solutions.
THE OPINIONS ON THIS PAGE, EXCEPT FOR THE ABOVE, DO NOT NECESSARILY REFLECT THE VIEWS OF THE GLEANER.
