‘Christmas will look different this year’

Although fully aware that much work remains to be done in her gritty St Andrew South West constituency, Angela Brown Burke has said she will be spending the Yuletide season quietly.

“I will be spending it quietly at home with family and try to ensure that I don’t add to those creating a spike in COVID,” Brown Burke told The Gleaner.

Brown Burke believes that Christmas time brings out the best in Jamaicans, with all the activities involving giving and assisting those less fortunate.

“This year, more than any other time, we really need to bring out that human side – the fact that we are not islands by ourselves, but we live in a community and, in a certain sense, we are responsible for each other,” she stated.

An internal political loss has culminated what has been a tough year for one of the few women sitting on the Opposition benches in the House of Representatives. Nonetheless, Brown Burke says she continues to push on.

“It has been a rough year, but I am also giving thanks to God because I believe that he has continued to bless me, and continues to bless my family... and I continue to pray that he will take us through,” Brown Burke told The Gleaner.

She said the usual annual Christmas dinner and concert held in the constituency would not be staged amid the prevailing COVID-19 pandemic.

However, she said, residents, particularly the elderly, will be given packages to put a smile on their faces, as the country weathers the tough economic times brought on by the spread of COVID-19.