The Editor, Sir:

I am writing to your paper for the first time as I feel that the current situation is extremely serious.

First and foremost, I believe that the present Government has been unfortunate, in so far as timing is concerned, whereas the world is experiencing its worst world recession since the 1930s.

However, in business, the unexpected always happens and one cannot hide from it. The unexpected is a reality and sorts out great from terrible leadership. If running a country were simple, everyone would be doing it!

However, our prime minister cannot do it alone. He must have the 100 per cent backing of his own party, the Opposition and various interest groups such as unions, private-sector organisations and most of all, Jamaicans living here and abroad, as everyone has a part to play at this critical time. Let's put Jamaica first for once!

Solutions

We must accept that investment inflows, remittances and tourism are not going to be what was expected and probably less than previous years. However, what we now need is a plan to compensate for this. Believe it or not, the solutions are not that hard to formulate.

Can the present Government do what no one in the previous 40 years promised but could never deliver due to bureaucracy, non-productive political opposition and simple and effective decision-making? The country is sitting on assets, such as land, shares, buildings and licences which are producing no economic activity. We need to sell them at the highest price they can fetch, whether it is $1 or a trillion dollars, but we need to do it quickly. We then need to immediately put this money to work, whether it is paying off debt, which in turn will reduce payment outflows and leave more for the Govern-ment to work with.

Infrastructure projects

Alternatively, and ideally, one would prefer to put the proceeds into what benefits the country. One example would be to build new roadways, which will immediately achieve three goals. First, it would be a labour-intensive pro-ject and would get the unemployed to work. Second, it would decrease the frustration experienced by the majority of Jamaicans who are held up in traffic jams for hours every day. Jamaica has turned into a car park for six hours of the day. Try calculating the amount of non-productive time spent by our most productive working sector. It is simply a crime!

Third, by decreasing the traffic gridlock, it will reduce substantially the amount of petrol and diesel consumed. This will decrease our demand to import fuel which, will in turn, decrease the pressure on the BOJ reserves, plus the Jamaican dollar. Some may even suggest that taxes should be doubled on the import of cars for the next three years as the Jamaican infrastructure cannot take any more.

However, what can never happen is for the proceeds to go into white elephant projects like the cricket stadium in Trelawny, or Netserve, which must go down as the greatest waste of Jamaican resources this century.

Alternative

The other benefit of selling assets that are lying there idle and producing nothing for the people of this country, is that there is a good chance that the person who purchases the asset will put it to use and hence employ more persons. The alternative is that we can do what we have been doing this and the last 40 years, which is to talk about it and achieve nothing!

In addition, part of the proceeds can be used to increase the skills of the Jamaican people so that whether here or abroad, they have a much better chance of becoming employed in a gainful manner.

The other strategy is to stop producing non-productive labour. The Government cannot just hire 3,000 more policemen as it does not have the sustainable income to pay for the wages and equipment. Instead, it needs to give people the skills to become productive in other areas.

I am, etc.,

'A.N. Other'

needhelpjamaica@gmail.com