Ronald Thwaites | Doing better, together

If you follow international news you will realise that, for all our problems, Jamaica is a blessed place to live. Check the unbelievable distress of our nearest sisters and brothers in Haiti. Check the abridgement of personal freedoms, side by side with impressive other advances, which describes life in Cuba.

Consider the avoidable distress in Venezuela, one of the richest countries in the hemisphere. Mourn with me over Nicaragua, home to many Jamaicans, where one cruel dictatorship has now morphed into another equally repressive regime, brought about by the same people who some of us assisted in overthrowing the Somoza bandits a generation or so ago.

Think of the murderous struggle in Ukraine, the drought and famine in big parts of Africa and Asia. Groan at the way democracy is being distorted and endangered in the richest nation of the world and give thanks that, for all the sufferation, all the spiritual and material hunger in our midst, Jamaica doesn’t stay like any of those countries.

And Lord, even as we grumble over our light bill increase, we must give thanks that, unlike the British people, we are not facing the cold of winter when electricity and heating costs have increased, first by 54 per cent over last year, and now by a further 80 per cent.

Mi a go tan a mi yaad…!

Here, albeit with grave and grievous exceptions, we enjoy a high measure of personal liberties – like freedom of expression and freedom of assembly, association and movement – routinely denied elsewhere. In many rich countries, writings (and writers!) like this would not see the light of day.

BENEFIT

We benefit from those basic services, still unnecessarily inadequate, required for survival; and many of the institutions which define and strengthen culture are proving durable and flexible in this land, despite efforts to undermine them.

I beg us not to take any of this for granted, even as we justifiably criticise the inequality, corruption and crime of our time; and even as we continue to reel from the ‘duppy-boxes’ of our unsettled past.

But our blessings should impel us to do so much better for ourselves. Because we can. To do so, the resources are not primarily financial, either. We can do much better with what we have in the fields of education, health, food supply and security.

Class and political considerations deprive us of the prosperity and social peace which lie within our grasp. After near to 25 years of intense engagement in political life, I am convinced that no single party by itself can stimulate the levels of trust and sacrifice needed to achieve even the modest yet elusive 2030 goals.

As you quint, party lines and electoral considerations prevail. Why do we think that after all the laborious work done by people like Howard Mitchell and Lloyd Distant, bipartisan cooperation on something as elemental as crime-fighting can hardly start, let alone be sustained?

Have you noticed how defensive and irritable of criticism the Prime Minister is sounding nowadays? Worthily, he is heard to speak more and more of the need for a national change of heart. Sadly, but obviously, the very order of political economy which he presides over, renders it impossible for him alone – or Mark, for that matter- to achieve what he prescribes.

BECOME DISILLUSIONED

Hard times and the impossibility of dealing with systemic causes of social and material poverty are, once again, and inevitably, causing ordinary people to become disillusioned with their political representatives and the capacity of state leadership to guide us, trustworthily and demonstrably, towards the future we yearn to experience.

The PSOJ often speaks with a unhelpful naiveté. They would appear to be distant from their own call for consensus. For they, same ones, fuel, fund and benefit from the very ingrained divisiveness of which they now complain. The trade unions have retreated into their chrysalis, and the Churches often forget the imperative of the cross.

In a recent conversation, I asked Dennis Chung how does a culture become more attuned to the fulfilment of personal ambition and high purpose through pursuit of the common good instead of self-aggrandisement. I asked how congruent are our politics, education and leadership styles to such ends.

Here is his reply. “ An organisation or a country always takes the mood and culture from its leaders … think Lee Kuan Yew and Mandela, and then think Trump and the Caribbean ... . The mindset of the leaders affects the policies that impact the mindset of the people … . The problem we have always had ... is that leadership is always accusing others and not first looking at themselves… .”

Members and aspirants of the leadership class in Jamaica: what do you have to say to that? Do we remember how Michael Manley’s zeal and charisma irreversibly turned the axis of national concern towards those hitherto excluded?

If Dennis is right, where does that leave us now? I am persuaded that the winner-take-all structure of national leadership, leading as it does to a prime-ministerial dictatorship – however benign – cannot take us where we want to go.

Horace Chang and Peter Bunting together have much better hope of leading us away from murderous violence than either on their own. At the very least, together they would carry the dwindling but still powerful bases of both parties. Clearly and obviously, Minister Williams needs the support of the charismatic Damion Crawford to sell the transformation of education.

The same is true with squatting, where the recent bromides by the minister are an almost word-for-word repetition of sentiments expressed by the equally resolute Donald Buchanan when he served in the same capacity many years ago. Needed, but unlikely then. Equally needed and unlikely now – if you try to do it alone.

Doing better, reviving the national spirit, repairing the past, building trust cannot be done in an atmosphere of congenital divisiveness. No money, no external influence can change this. It is our struggle.

We have so much to be thankful for, and so much to be ashamed of.

Rev Ronald G. Thwaites is an attorney-at-law. Send feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com.