Column: Why so many Jamaicans want passports

I was pleased to read in the, local press that on Monday this week about 30 persons were able to apply for and receive their passports on the same day.

The emotional disturbance at the passport office recently appears to have refocused the management of the Passport Immigration and Citizens Agency (PICA).

Service at the PICA office seems to have returned to or excelled that for which I complimented them in one of my columns in July last year.

I have had the privilege of living in nine different countries in the West, Europe, the Middle East and Asia and travelled to and done business in about 107 nations in the world. I have had the chance to take a first-hand look at why people would choose to leave their countries - the safety, comfort and security of family and homeland - to live in strange and sometimes hostile territories. I have seen the effects of remittances in countries like India, Sri Lanka and the Philippines and, of course, Jamaica.

The truth is that people leave their countries for many reasons. The wealthy leave because they can and are able to afford homes in a multiplicity of places around the world.

Many professionals leave because of business and employment opportunities overseas, the young and bright leave to secure education, while the poor and intrepid leave their homeland for better economic opportunities overseas.

There is a good reason why the additional $2,000 caused such an uproar at the passport office. The price of this document that is the literal passport from poverty in Jamaica to promised prosperity elsewhere was being increased by 44 per cent. That high price increase compares rather negatively to the five per cent salary increase offer made to civil servants by the Government.

POVERTY DRIVING SURGE

I have noticed that in rich and big countries such as the United States, many of their citizens live many decades of their lives - in rare occasions sometimes their whole lives - without ever seeking or securing a passport. Often, the size of their countries give citizens natural travelling options and the wealth of their countries give nationals the comfort of not looking for jobs overseas.

Regrettably, while Jamaica is ,beautiful and many of us take many holidays at places around the country, far too many Jamaicans are pinched and pained by poverty, and so are forced to leave to find better economic prospects.

The polling statistics tell us that Jamaicans want to leave in droves. Some months ago, a poll commissioned by The Gleaner found that a whopping 43 per cent of Jamaicans would give up their nationality for a job and, therefore, better economic prospects overseas. Chronic unemployment is therefore one of the driving forces behind the quarrelsome reaction at the price increase for new passports.

There is a growing phenomenon of Jamaican parents scraping every cent they can save together to send their teenage and even older children overseas to study and establish themselves in a foreign country - usually the United States and Canada, but others as well - because these parents see no hope for their children in Jamaica.

This is a serious indictment on those who have governed this country, and of the last 26 years, 22 of those have been under PNP administration. This despair on the part of Jamaicans who would love their kids to study, work, establish and build their families and earn good wages to live decently and safely, is one of the driving reasons behind so many people leaving Jamaica and therefore needing new passports.

LOW GROWTH, FEW JOBS

Even if we were to get the murder rate down to zero tomorrow and the current no-job circumstances still prevailed, people would still be seeking passports to leave.

If we were to achieve our fiscal consolidation objectives overnight and there were no more job opportunities created, people would still be seeking passports to leave.

If we were to pass all 15 quarterly IMF tests and still have not found a way to create many more new jobs, people would still be seeking new passports to leave.

It is an absolute fact that if we cannot grow our economy more than the 0.3 per cent that we recorded in fiscal year 2013-14, then Jamaicans will still be seeking many new passports in order to leave the country and its poverty behind.

The prime minister and her economic managers hate to hear this, but they secured the mandate from the people and a main part of that responsibility is to be held accountable for the proper economic management of the country.

In a real sense, so many Jamaicans are seeking to get new passports because the Government is failing to facilitate and enable appreciable and sensible economic growth, and jobs are too hard to find for too many people.

An ominous development is that many entrepreneurs who run small and medium-size businesses are quietly sending away the younger members of their families. Equally quietly, they are transferring their assets overseas, and without the fanfare of 'five-flights-a-day' are leaving or making plans to leave.

This is as bad, or worse, economic news as the relentless increase and imposition of new taxes, or the continuing inefficiencies in government which stymie business and economic growth. These entrepreneurs are real assets that the country can ill afford to lose.

They, too, fearing poverty and poor economic prospects, are securing passports to leave.

Aubyn Hill is CEO of Corporate Strategies Ltd and chairman of the Economic Advisory Council of the Opposition Leader.

Email: writerhill@gmail.com

Twitter: @hillaubyn

Facebook: facebook.com/hillaubyn