Emancipation Day 2023: Holness champions mental freedom, Golding urges collective action
Published:Tuesday | August 1, 2023 | 10:21 AM
Prime Minister Andrew Holness is urging Jamaicans to guard fiercely the freedom of their minds in the information age when they are being bombarded by all kinds of information.
In his Emancipation Day message, Holness reminded of the quote from National Hero Marcus Garvey which states: “We are going to emancipate ourselves from mental slavery because whilst others might free the body, none but ourselves can free the mind.”
Holness opined that nowadays people are being "bombarded by all kinds of information, which without context and discernment, can imprison us in negativity and impact our mind, prospects and mental health."
"Marcus Garvey encourages us to use our intelligence to work out the real things of life, not the imagined things, not the speculative things, not the fake things, not the perverse and sensational things, but the things that will guarantee a condition better than the one we inherited from your forefathers," he said.
Holness said Jamaicans should, therefore, spend their time engaging in uplifting activities and consuming positive and meaningful information that will not weigh them down.
Meanwhile, Opposition Leader Mark Golding, in his Emancipation Day message, urged Jamaicans to confront the challenges facing the nation head-on, with courage and collective commitment.
"We must rededicate ourselves to eradicating poverty, to ensuring access to quality education and healthcare for all Jamaicans, to building social cohesion to reduce violent crime, and to protecting our environment and ecological heritage," he said.
He argued that to achieve these fundamental goals, the country must deliberately build a system of inclusive socio-economic relationships and structures which nurture innovation, self-improvement and entrepreneurship and generate sustainable economic growth.
"As we embrace Emancipation Day, let us embrace each other as well. Our collective efforts will shape the future of this great nation. We can rise above our challenges and find common ground to uplift our nation, community by community, district by district, town by town, and parish by parish," Golding said.
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