Phew!

Gary Spaulding, Senior Gleaner Writer

AS THE curtains stealthily descend on 2010, a shell-shocked Bruce Golding administration seeks desperately to recover from an eventful year which featured massive upheavals in the realms of governance.

With 2010 slipping into the annals of history, the raft of troubling issues that ripped the administration asunder throughout the year obstinately refused to recede from the Government's agenda even as it struggled to make the most of its accomplishments.

The flurry of predictions that Prime Minister Bruce Golding would buckle under extreme pressure was dizzying as the gamut of problems threatened to overwhelm his administration.

Many believed and some hoped that the end was near for Golding - the man who has shown time and time again that he is replete with political lives.

It was a year that featured a massive earthquake which devastated Haiti, one of Jamaica's closest neighbours, and shook up Jamaicans in more ways than one; but tremors and aftershocks of a different kind wobbled the Golding government unceasingly.

Wished it would slip away

When an obdurate Golding recanted in May after refusing for months to accede to a United States request to extradite celebrated Tivoli Gardens area leader Christopher 'Dudus' Coke, the Government hoped that the issue which had bedevilled the party from the previous year would have slipped into oblivion.

But this was not to be.

Jamaicans shuddered as a mighty army burst with a loud noise through the might of the Tivoli Gardens fort, supremely controlled until then by Coke, leaving death and destruction in its wake in a year when the proverbial chickens came home to roost.

It was in 2010 that the Coke dynasty collapsed, sending the superdon's reign crashing, while the Manatt, Phelps & Phillips muddle freaked out the Government.

Coke is behind bars in the United States awaiting trial since mid-year, but the debate over which organisation engaged the reputable United States law firm, Manatt, Phelps & Phillips, refused to fizzle.

The Opposition People's National Party is of the view that the crowning moment of Bruce Golding's failed governance is the engagement of Manatt, Phelps & Phillips, and the attempt to obstruct Coke's extradition.

The incursion into Tivoli Gardens by the security forces, occasioning the loss of 73 lives and the cost to the economy calculated at one per cent of GDP, still weighs heavily on the Golding government.

There were some positive achievements by the Government, but these were eclipsed by the seemingly apocalyptic events of 2010.

Even as the economy floundered under negative global forces, the Bruce Golding administration was able to garner widespread support for the Jamaica Debt Exchange, regarded by some experts as the most successful government-debt operation of its kind.

The Government continues to celebrate as a monumental achievement the re-engagement of multilateral financial institutions that provide access to loans at low interest rates.

And Finance Minister Audley Shaw relishes the opportunity to stress that the economy benchmark Treasury bill rates are the lowest in nearly 30 years.

The Government pats itself on the back for what it dubs the success of the International Monetary Fund agreement and the passing of all subsequent tests.

The Bruce Golding administration hopes to be propelled once more in the driver's seat by the US$400-million road-rehabilitation project, while the Opposition appears to be worried that this may be the fillip that the Government needs to surge ahead.

Kudos for reduced crime

The Government has got kudos for its part in slashing the crime rate, including murder, with its detractors contending that it was the ill-fated incursion into Tivoli Gardens which did the trick.

But it is yet to benefit from two of its initiatives: the coming developments in our energy sector (National Energy Policy, LNG, Renewables), and the INDECOM, the body to probe police excesses.

However, Bruce Golding and his team continue to be assailed by criticisms that its decision to impose new tax measures are devoid of the requisite levels of consultation with sector representatives.

gary.spaulding@gleanerjm.com