Unlicensed Negril jet ski operators lash out - Demand to be regularised than be stripped of their livelihood

Karrie Williams, Gleaner Writer

WESTERN BUREAU:

Unlicensed jet ski operators in the resort town of Negril have taken objection to a recent announcement by Tourism Minister Dr Wykeham McNeill in which he outlined a raft of measures to clamp down on their operations.

Orville Simmons, who acted as spokesperson for the aggrieved operators, told Western Focus on Tuesday that he and his colleagues were deeply displeased with the manner in which the minister dealt with the situation, and according to him, the illegal operators were left out of all the consultations.

"I am an illegal operator, and I am very, very disappointed in Mr McNeil. He needs to come here and talk with us and hear from us. He cannot ignore us because we are the ones who put him in power. We want to become regularised. He cannot ignore us like that. We are his constituents, so he also has a responsibility to look out for our welfare and do better for us," Simmons said.

During a presentation in the House of Representatives last week Tuesday, the minister, who is also member of parliament for Western Westmoreland where Negril is located, outlined a number of new measures he said that were aimed at curtailing the activities of illegal jet ski operators. He said, among other things, that Cabinet had approved a six-month suspension on the importation of all jet skis for commercial use and that the Ministry of Tourism had consulted with the Marine Police and the Jamaica Defence Force Coast Guard, which would conduct concentrated enforcement activities to seize and detain all illegal vessels.

But in expressing worry over the economic displacement that would result from the announced plan to seize all unlicensed jet skis, Simmons said he and his colleagues had no alternative source of income and so had written to the Maritime Authority of Jamaica requesting a meeting.

"This is our livelihood. I have no other option. I am 43 years old. Right now I owe the bank, and I have to pay my instalment for my jet ski. If he (McNeil) then goes and does something like that, what's gonna happen to me and my colleagues? How will we feed our families? To bring one of these jet skis into the island, it's almost half a million dollars to bring it in, and for the Government to do that to us, it is very unfair," he said.

Redistribute licences

"I'm in water sports 23 years, and my experience in water sports is that the Government only granted seven (jet ski) licences (in Negril), and out of the seven, five are currently not in use. Only two are in use at the moment," Simmons said. "So for those licences that are not in use, why doesn't the Tourist Board take back those licences and redistribute them to us unlicensed operators so we can become legal? That is the aim we are looking forward to discussing in the meeting that we have requested with the Maritime Authority."

When the question was posed by Western Focus as to whether he had any plans to assist in securing alternative livelihoods for the now-displaced jet ski operators, McNeill did not directly address the question but maintained that the Government had a duty to prevent illicit activities from taking place in the resort areas.

"We as a society, we as a government, are irresponsible if we do not control these things. We are doing that, and we are ensuring that those that are legal operators operate within the boundaries of the law, and for those that are outside, we have to now lock down that system because we cannot have an unregulated system," he said. "As to what you do, whether you regularise that, or whether or not you stop it, is part of the discussion that has to take place going forward.

"Because, quite frankly, there are two elements of this discussion: there is a large element of persons who are advocating the total ban; and there is another side of persons who feel that with proper regulations, we can move forward," McNeill added. "We are, in the first case, putting the proper regulations in place. We then will be reviewing it, and if we feel the system is working, with consultations with the sectors in the community and others, we'll determine what we are doing going forward."