EDITORIAL - Fixing JFJ

It's hardly a surprise that the spate of resignations from Jamaicans for Justice (JFJ), including its new executive director, Kay Osborne, has been interpreted by some as a crumbling of the human-rights organisation. That need not be the case.

Much, however, depends on the will of those who remain and the value Jamaicans store in the organisation. We believe that Jamaica has been better off for a robust JFJ.

The proximate cause of the organisation's troubles stems from the controversial sex-education programme that it ran in a number of children's homes, on the initiative of its former executive director, Carolyn Gomes, and which of the directors, including Dr Gomes' successor, Ms Osborne, knew what, and when, about the implementation of the project.

We, however, do not believe that is the entire picture. The current developments are not peculiar to JFJ, or uncommon to institutions in transition.

For most of its decade and a half of existence, JFJ was dominated by two strong personalities, whose vision of its role appeared to be substantially in concert - Dr Gomes, who was the inspiration of its founding, and Susan Goffe, who was at one time its executive director, until she shifted roles with Dr Gomes to become its chairman.

They spoke stridently about perceived breaches of human rights in Jamaica, ranging from alleged abuses by the security forces to the maltreatment of children in the care of the State. They took their concerns to the domestic courts and international tribunals and sometimes their interventions were presumed to bear a politically partisan tinge. But critically, as has been revealed by the imbroglio over the sex-education initiative, the JFJ of Gomes and Goffe articulated a broader interpretation of human rights.

Their partial retreat from the dominance of the organisation and the coincidental eruption of the sex-education furore appear to have unleashed seemingly simmering, although perhaps unstated, alternative views about direction. The thing for members to do now is not to cut and run but, as we previously suggested, to engage in a frank debate on what kind of organisation JFJ wants to be, then clearly articulate its core functions and put in place robust governance structures.

The JFJ has done much good work. It can do more.

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