Garth Rattray | My plea to mainstream media

It is blatantly obvious that, unless something is catastrophic, or monumental enough to provide positive ‘optics’ or is beneficial to the ‘narrative’ that they wish to portray, the authorities often choose to be conspicuously silent (I call it dismissive silence) in many matters that directly or indirectly affect us all in a negative way.

In general, the media not only plays an essential role in providing information to the public, it also (in no small way) plays a significant role in forming public opinion. The media houses have become the sentinels of accountability, but they are not fulfilling their role to the best of their ability. Sometimes social media attempts to hold the authorities accountable, but it is unregulated and has been infiltrated and hijacked by so many people and organisations with ulterior motives that they cannot be trusted. Most see social media as entertainment and gossip.

I would love to see mainstream media practitioners doggedly taking on projects that the authorities have either chosen to [conveniently] totally ignore, or to put on the back burner and hope that everyone forgets. There are so many situations and happenings that beg for media attention that it is very troubling.

Pressured or shamed

It would be ‘unhealthy’ for individual contributors to keep badgering the powers that be, someone would label them supporters of the Opposition and/or threaten to kill them. This is the Jamaica in which we are living. However, if a member of the newspaper staff were to take on a topic and keep at it month after month until the government is pressured or shamed into dealing with the issue, people may label the entire newspaper as supporters of the Opposition, but individual lives would not be endangered.

For example, I am always irked when I see that a poorly constructed building has collapsed and killed someone … then a bunch of public servants from the responsible municipality appears on the scene of the disaster (after the fact), with the police and news teams in tow. Where were they when the building was under construction? Where were they while the poor construction techniques were being done? Who was supposed to carry out the [mandatory] inspections? Who will be held responsible? Journalists need to publicise these things and keep at them repeatedly until the authorities provide the answers that we need, and until someone or some people are held responsible for the failure.

Since it is painfully obvious that complaining to the authorities about illegal construction is usually unhelpful, I would love to see the mainstream media set up and publicise a hotline for concerned or abused citizens to call to report infractions. I can tell you that the reporting system for municipalities is fraught with inefficiencies. It is blatantly unfair for citizens to have to hire an attorney-at-law, or a law firm to try to put a stop to, or to correct the constructions on premises that break the law. Not only is it extremely expensive (so the vast majority cannot afford to do so), but it is risky (because it is much cheaper to kill the complainant rather than correct the construction problems).

I know of a case where an illegal activity was properly reported to a municipality. Month after month, for seven long years, the matter was raised in their scheduled meetings. No one bothered to ask why the problem remained unresolved. Eventually, after the police intervened independent of the municipality, it was discovered that the individual who was assigned the duty of delivering the notice to fix the problem was a good friend of the offender. Because of the nature of the infraction, citizens of that community were subject to several ambushes from opportunistic robbers and traffic flow problems until the police took matters into their own hands.

HOTLINE TIPS

Using the hotline tips, investigative journalists will have a lot of material with which to work. They can check into the allegations, and if there are anomalies, they can publicise them repeatedly until the powers that be are forced to remedy them. There are currently several outstanding ‘white elephants’ that cost taxpayers many millions of hard-earned dollars. During the early stages of their planning, citizens objected but their pleas fell on deaf ears, filled with green or orange wax. Now, the [publicly funded] edifices either lie totally dormant and are still subject to costly security measures or are horribly underutilised but cost citizens millions of dollars annually to guard and/or maintain. They are a waste of scarce resources while many citizens are unable to find food, clothing, housing, or proper medical care!

Since, for various reasons, the authorities usually ignore the illegal sidewalk food establishments, the food vendors without any Food Handler’s Permit, and without any personal sanitary conveniences, investigative journalism would be the means by which the public is protected. The aforementioned infractions exist all across Jamaica. It’s either that the authorities do not want to upset their voting base by insisting that they obey the law, or the authorities are incompetent. Either way, the public is unprotected, and indiscipline becomes the norm.

It is sad, infuriating, and frustrating to realise that we simply cannot trust the people who have been elected and selected to protect us to simply do their job. There is a lot of politics and engrained inefficiencies behind the failings of these public entities. We need investigative journalism to expose them.

Garth A. Rattray is a medical doctor with a family practice. Send feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com and garthrattray@gmail.com