In Focus

From colony to Independence - Part 2File PhotosPrincess Margaret talks with Norman Manley, opposition leader, shortly after her arrival at Palisadoes Airport on August 5, 1962.

Below are excerpts from junior foreign minister Arnaldo Brown's Sectoral Debate presentation to Parliament on July 10.Jamaica is indeed intricately linked to the global economy and tremendously...

All things considered, we have much to be proud of as a country in the 50th year of its birth as an independent nation.

There is no post-Independence decade fraught with as much tension, divisiveness, bitterness, class warfare as the 1970s.

Every so often, a newspaper prints a story to remind us of a situation that has existed for a very long time. The story is usually presented in such a manner that gets us agitated, shocked and upset. The result is that we flood the airwaves with our usual condemnation, vowing this must stop and should never happen again.

I would have loved to continue the analysis of the shame in Parliament last week, but the despicable, recalcitrant and unexemplary behaviour of one particular parliamentarian doesn't deserve more of my intellectual attention.

The number of Jamaicans who live below the poverty line is unacceptable for a country of this size and with people as proud as we are. From all indications, more than one million of our people struggle daily to provide the basic amenities of food, shelter, clothing and educational opportunities to satisfy immediate family and household needs.

Today, I do a double take, working on education and government consultants. The two news-making matters may not be as unrelated as it appears at first blush. The Ministry of Education, we have been advised, has the second-largest payout for advisers and consultants, after Finance and Planning.

Culture Minister Lisa Hanna's Budget presentation addressed many issues under her portfolio of responsibilities, but perhaps her maiden speech will be most remembered for her attempts at salvaging what many feel (real or perceived) have been missteps at planning the activities to mark Jamaica 50.

If my section editor or any young adult interested in Jamaican music doesn't know who Delroy Wilson is, or wonders why he would be important enough to command attention outside the Entertainment pages, ...

This series of articles comes out of work done for the Education Cluster of the 50/50 project spearheaded by the Sir Arthur Lewis Institute of Social and Economic Studies at University of the West Indies, Mona.

Give a backbencher MP a lifeline by baiting him with a minor controversy and he will swallow it hook, line and sinker, like a fish.