Mr Roger Clarke, the former agricul-ture minister, recently spent a lot of time defending his stewardship during the People's National Party's (PNP) administration and insisting that he should be taken seriously.

We have tried our best so to do, as hard as he makes it. But we are afraid that we have to side with Glenn Tucker, in his specific references to Mr Clarke, in his Letter of the Day published on this page in yesterday's Gleaner.

Of particular concern is how Mr Clarke has responded to the Government's initiative to deal with the rising price of fertiliser, which has been a matter of great concern to farmers. Among the plans put forward by the Government is to import the stuff, including from Ukraine.

An alarmist

Mr Clarke has chosen not to be engaging and thoughtful about this plan, but to be frightening and alarmist in an effort to gain political points on the cheap.

The Ukraine happens to be the Soviet state where a nuclear power reactor, Chernobyl, in the north of the country, exploded in 1986, sending radioactive contaminants into the atmosphere and into surrounding areas. The meltdown caused the evacuation of the nearby city of Pripyat and the creation of a large exclusion zone around the radius of the plant.

Intervention offensive

So, the fact that there may be questions about importing natural material-based products from the Ukraine, is not of itself unreasonable.

What we find offensive, however, was the tone and construct of Mr Clarke's heavy and thumping intervention; its a priori assumption that anything manufactured in Ukraine is contaminated and that the Jamaican Government was on a mission to bring radioactive fertiliser to Jamaica to "kill off poor people".

We believe that Mr Clarke, in his utterances on this matter, has displayed a recklessness that is unbecoming of a former minister, parliamen-tarian and aspirant to future political office. It suggests not only that the Government cares nothing of the interest of Jamaicans but that Jamaican technocrats are so inadequate at their jobs that they would cause to be sourced, material that would do harm to the Jamaican people. Or, taken to its logical conclusion, every other country that imports from Ukraine recklessly places the welfare of their citizens in harm's way.

It is one thing to insist that all safety mechanisms are in place and hazard warnings work. It is another, however, to deliberately attempt to create public panic. Even if unintended, that is the likely consequence of Mr Clarke's behaviour.

Ridiculing the rice idea

It is the same style the former minister brought to the current incumbent Christopher Tufton's announcement of a plan to establish an experimental five-acre rice farm, to test whether Jamaica should re-enter rice production. Mr Clarke sought to ridicule the idea, saying - many may claim only partially in jest - that when he eats rice, the output from five acres would hardly satisfy.

But, perhaps, that is precisely the problem. Mr Clarke may have been chomping through his rice to give worthwhile thought to things. Hence, the sorry state in which he left agriculture.

And, when he is not eating rice, he seems to exercise his jaws by talking nonsense.