EDITORIAL - Surrendering downtown?

The vision of a revived downtown Kingston has been well articulated in these columns for some time, and this newspaper's efforts, with its just-launched 'Destination Downtown' campaign, seek to add momentum to the hope for lasting improvement to the capital's bustling business district.

Indeed, many political and business leaders have also lent their voice to the national conversation on reclaiming the zone from infrastructural decay and the clutches of criminals who run pockets of the city as fiefdoms.

There has been plenty of talk, tragically cheap talk, which is, perhaps, congruous with downtown's emphasis on discounts.

But if there is to be economically and socially sustainable development in Kingston's university of hard knocks, that dream will only be realisable in the context of a city where both merchant and consumer believe it is safe to do business.

Last May's uprooting of strongman Christopher 'Dudus' Coke and a loyalist militia sent a strong message to criminals that the security forces were able, and willing, to crush any group which posed an existential threat to the State.

Crime's insidious return

Since then, the tentacles of the police have receded somewhat, and they have become more accommodating of lawlessness.

Last Thursday, our sister newspaper, THE STAR, published a story about the blatant takeover, by extortionists, of parking spaces along downtown thoroughfares such as Orange, Princess and Barry streets. Thugs block access to parking with stones, and any attempt by motorists to use public spaces, without paying 'tribute', is met with fierce resistance.

Said Special Inspector Noel Daley of the Harbour Street Police Post: "If motorists come out of their vehicles to remove the stones, they meet up on resistance from thugs, verbal first, and then the motorists will back down.

"Most persons will park in no-parking areas and take their chance with the police rather than face the extortionists," Daley emphasised.

Even visitors to the Kingston Public Hospital, who park on an open lot adjacent to the facility, pay 'watchmen' $100 on the basis of 'protection'.

Time to take charge

But our police force must understand that while a blitzkrieg might have repelled the firepower of the pro-Coke gangsters, it is sustained police patrols and a policy of zero tolerance that will maintain law and order.

Criminals have got used to nine-day wonders, where clampdowns send thugs scurrying, only for them to return weeks later, emboldened by the inaction of municipal authorities and the police.

And Kingston Mayor Desmond McKenzie knows this only too well. For in a story published today, he diagnoses the problem with unerring clarity. He says: "The powers that be surrendered downtown Kingston to the lawless element, and once you surrender an area, something else is going to come in its place."

Senior Superintendent Terrence Bent, and Superintendent Steve McGregor, who command the Kingston Western and Central police divisions, respectively, must take control of the hunting grounds of extortionists who operate in full view of the authorities.

For such a campaign, mirroring the recent crackdown on the lifeblood of wealth for the Clansman gang in Spanish Town, would signal to the business community and consumers that they will no longer be forced to plunge deeper into their pockets to appease an underworld government operating side by side with officialdom.

Will Messrs McKenzie, Bent and McGregor surrender downtown to the lawless element?

The opinions on this page, except for the above, do not necessarily reflect the views of The Gleaner. To respond to a Gleaner editorial, email us: editor@gleanerjm.com or fax: 922-6223. Responses should be no longer than 400 words. Not all responses will be published.