Mark Wignall | She hurts every day

‘The case should be remitted to the Court of Appeal in Jamaica to decide whether to order a retrial of the Vybz Kartel for the murder of Clive ‘Lizard’ Williams’ or versions of the eagerly awaited Privy Council ruling last Thursday meant many things to more than a few people.

“We is Jamaicans.” said the young man who later told me he is 28. “Straight up. Our heroes is not on the big list. The politician list. Vybz is on our list. Him challenge di system and him reach to nuff yout mindset. Dats why high society fraid a him,” as he formed a fist and gesticulated liberally. He was ready to attack the fortress.

An hour before that I was in a telephone conversation with a school principal who was at pains as she lamented to me the realities facing many of the bright children attending her school who may not make it because about 60 per cent were from single-parent (mother only) homes where the mother was barely scratching out a daily existence budget.

“Mark, the children are so bright. At my school, the resources are simply not there. In the public-school system in many European schools, having one teacher to 40 children would be scandalous. In Jamaica, and certainly at my school, it is the norm, not a scandal. Each morning I carry a big bag with me. I wake up at 4 a.m. and I begin to prepare sandwiches. Sardines, bully beef, bologna. I know many of them will not be properly fed at that important time.”

“Who? Vybz Kartel?” said a man to me as I spoke on the phone. I broke from the call. “Mark, I hope they keep that man in jail for the longest time. Horrible influence on our young children,” he said of Kartel. I smiled at him. He could be somewhere in his late 60s.

And that’s how it broke last Thursday. Older people saw Kartel as deserving of one hundred life sentences. To young people he was a freedom fighter. My view is that parents needed to listen to what their young children were listening to and they needed to shape their children into knowing patty from burnt-out toto.

As Bob Marley struggled to break through in his own Jamaican society in the 1970s, there were many in the top echelons here who feared what Marley stood for. A challenge to what they saw as ‘decency.’ Marley had his hair uncut, and to them, unkempt. He deserved to be kept below the social ladder. Downtown, down there.

I never viewed Kartel and Marley through the same tinted glasses. Both wanted their own piece of the pie and neither of them was prepared to seek our permission or beg us to allow them a little space at the top. But I saw something much more powerful in Marley even as Marley’s influence in uptown Jamaica of the 1970s was significantly less than Kartel’s influence in uptown Jamaica of the 2000s.

Marley’s music and his message had a redemptive effect. For wider swathes of the population, Kartel wanted to displace the thinking of many of our young people while nothing useful and workable was promised. Light it, blow it up, enjoy it.

In all of the bits and pieces of the conversation that we had I never sensed that the well-known school principal saw anything useful about Kartel to mention his name. “I am sick and tired of being part of such an important part of Jamaican society as teaching administration is to just sit back while knowing it’s not working out. I feel as if I am failing at what I see as my ‘calling’ in life. I feel as if I am personally failing”’

“You know you are not a failure,” I said. I have known her for 15 years. And I also knew her ability to bear pressure. “You will go to school tomorrow, you will suffer tomorrow, and you will devise new solutions tomorrow. You told me years ago that building a nation is made of of those realities.”

NEW POLICE COMMISSIONER MEANS WHAT?

Having a new police commissioner allows us to have a new moment of hope and a time to believe that Dr Kevin Blake can really make a difference. Blake comes to the force with many key people in our country giving him high fives.

I am a little bit wary of the high expectations, but this time around, I am tempted to go along with those who have known him for many years and see him as the perfect fit to walk into the boots of Major General Antony Anderson.

It is the usual that we Jamaicans view another police commissioner almost as we think of the political appointment of a minister of national security. A seat to occupy, a desk to fail at. A place to gather grey hair and experience heart palpitations.

I want to join those congratulating Dr Blake. He knows that the nation will be expecting much. He knows that the days of 10 to 15 per cent cut in homicides will not amount to much. It will be 40 to 50 per cent in his first year of operations. The template is laid out. It has to be or Anderson’s stint would not be worth it.

Of course Dr Blake will not be able to conjure up magical routines. Like this. Two days before the local government elections. In a volatile garrison community. “My boy in a shop nearby. Dis young hothead walk up to a man, bout 40 and ask him if him a go vote. Di man seh him a work pon a site and have no interest in voting. Di hothead just tek out him gun and shot di bredda. Kill him just like dat.”

The reality of community policing would be in the forefront of Dr Blake’s plans. Indeed, community policing is the essence of policing. His PhD must speak for him in little bars, shops, and along gully banks. He is perfectly equipped for that. He knows it. We want to feel it and see it happening.

Mark Wignall is a political and public affairs analyst. Send feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com and mawigsr@gmail.com.