A useful parallel can be drawn in contemporary international relations between 1935, when Mussolini invaded Abyssinia (Ethiopia), and 2022, when Russian President Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine. The comparison suggests that the war in Ukraine has...
I know this is a New Year. But will Jamaica take a new approach to overcome the fundamental obstacle to its progress? It’s neither political nor religious. The one issue blocking Jamaica from success is the way we educate our children. This isn’t...
Jamaica knows the Atlantic story too well. Between the early slave trade and abolition, somewhere between 600,000 and 900,000 Africans were forced onto the island. Shipping records show that a material share of Jamaica’s human cargo came from ports...
Last week’s story in The Gleaner - “When Kids Get Caught — Heartache as grandmother struggles with teen grandson’s sexual assault charges” - laid bare a heartbreaking but avoidable consequence of our current law. A 16-year-old boy - a prefect and...
As we reflect on 2025 and look ahead to a new year, we do so at a moment of profound national significance. For the first time in more than three decades, Jamaica has recorded fewer than 700 murders in a single year. The provisional figure of 673...
I was warned about what I would see before heading to Black River, but no image of the damage from Hurricane Melissa fully captured the devastation, and nothing prepared me for the horror of the stories people shared. I had visited Black River...
Hurricane Melissa’s vastly different human and infrastructural impact between eastern and western Jamaica has continued into the early recovery stages. There is another, far less obvious, disaster divide that is affecting some of the most...
In many ways, it has to be more than just what you feel about me and significantly deeper than that. It has to be much more than that. I want to feel an intense connection. Closer than it could ever be. Somewhat more tender than anything could ever...
Despite most of us having no clue where the time went it seems another new year is upon us. The thing about time is that it not only flies but changes direction, fortunes and perspectives while doing so. Time is multi faceted. And relentless. For...
Jamaica’s prolonged mistreatment of Haitian migrants is often defended in the language of capacity, sovereignty, or political realism. Yet five years on — and now brutally exposed by Hurricane Melissa (a manmade weapon of mass destruction without...
“… I will uncover your skirts over your face, That your shame may appear …” was spoken by God to the prophet Jeremiah about ancient Israel. Is this exposure applicable to post-disaster Jamaica? Hurricane Melissa making landfall on October 28...
Jamaica has agreed to a number of international agreements that bind it to providing an accessible and inclusive environment for persons with disabilities. The United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD) and the...
Some time ago you either bought or were gifted, probably by a spouse or parent, a different type of telephone. It was shaped like a half oval. It wasn’t attached to the wall. It could fit in your pocket. All you had to do was flip it open, punch in...
Drone footage and satellite images taken after Hurricane Melissa revealed a landscape littered with wreckage - trees stripped bare, vegetation ripped from the ground, roofing sheets, doors, windows, furniture, bedding, and every possible object...
The Maroons are a distinct but divided people. Some Maroons find their national identity through full membership of Jamaican society as Jamaican nationals, engaging in Jamaican cultural life, sharing as Jamaicans in the pleasures and pains of...
The arrival of 117 Canadian electrical linesmen to assist the Jamaica Public Service Company (JPS) in restoring power after Hurricane Melissa has been greeted with official smiles, airport photo-ops, and an oddly incurious media tone. We are told...
When the winds died down and the floodwaters receded, what remained was not only broken infrastructure, but broken routines, broken security and broken peace of mind. And yet, our recovery discourse still treats mental health as secondary, optional...
This comes with the most bold-faced audacity; The Jamaica Public Service (JPS) claiming seven per cent increase in electricity rates. What makes this so jarring to the nerves is what went down before. As I previously stated, JPS is 80 per cent...
In recent times, I have had conversations with persons with disabilities and others within the society about the Disabilities Act that has been enacted in Jamaica. Some of these individuals have concluded that the legislation is not impactful on...
So, last week ( A very Private Public Service) I complained about the reaction to my critique of the JPS “loan”. I wrote: “….I’m told to shut up because I’m safe in Kingston and don’t feel what western-based Jamaicans feel.... Based on this puerile...
Driving into West Green, Montego Bay, the damage from Hurricane Melissa even a month later was still unmistakable. Dried mud crusted the roadway and, in front of almost every house were piles of damaged furniture, appliances, and mattresses -...
Jamaica’s public procurement system was built to protect taxpayers and ensure value for money. But, alongside these strengths sits a stubborn problem: delay. Too often, our own rules slow us down, dulling the impact of the very projects designed to...
If you travel far enough into St Catherine, past the bustle and the quick talk of the capital, you’ll find Wood Hall. It’s a quiet place, the kind of community where yards feel like open hands and children learn early that neighbours are family....
In 2019, as Hurricane Dorian literally sat on Abaco in The Bahamas (between 27 and 36 hours) and achieved a consistent 185mph, none could know that it was sending a message to Jamaica about the monster to come: Melissa in 2025. Old-time Jamaicans...
