Parts of Ja ceded to badmen – Pandohie

Business manager and chief executive of the multibillion-dollar Seprod Group of Companies, Richard Pandohie, says sections of Jamaica have been ceded to badmen and nowhere is its impact more clearly demonstrated than among the manufacturing and distribution sectors.

In a recent interview with The Gleaner, he said the security forces will not admit it, but among the business community it is well known that “you enter some areas at your own risk” and Central Village in St Catherine is one such community.

“There are communities that no one can get into. In the mornings, you go to Central Village and you see all the trucks parked up outside, distribution trucks. They can’t go in there. People have to come and get what they want. And there are others like that where you just can’t get into,” he told The Gleaner.

Continuing, he said:“And the reality is that people know you have to pay a ‘toll’ (cash or kind) to get in, whether they take goods off the trucks or something else. But that’s a reality,” he said sadly.

Central Village is less than three miles away from crime-infested Spanish Town, which is the country’s first capital and home to the poisonous guts of two of Jamaica’s deadliest and most organised gangs - One Order and Klansman. The community is less than 15 miles from Kingston, with gang activities mostly centred in St Catherine, but their fangs spread islandwide. Deadly gang activities also play out across Kingston, with murders becoming commonplace.

Pandohie was responding to questions from The Gleaner while addressing issues impacting Jamaica which have resulted in a stunting of its progress economically, socially and politically. According to him, Jamaica was fast becoming what El Salvador was, where individuals could not enter certain communities without paying thugs.

Once considered the ‘murder capital of the world’ with more than 100 homicides per 100,000 in 2015, El Salvador’s murder rate has seen dramatic decreases since 2016, and even more reduction since Nayib Bukele took power in 2019. Crime has been attributed to the activities of that country’s deadly street gangs. Jamaican authorities say the majority of homicides here are also as a result of gang activities, through organised crime.

But the business executive says Jamaica is too small for crime to continue bedevilling the nation, even as he accepts that things have spiralled far out of control and there is no quick fix.

FIX CRIME

The Jamaican Government has been using states of emergency as a containment measure, but murders spike once the measure is lifted. The Opposition and the Government are at odds over its use. Pandohie is impatient with both.

“I believe we still have the capacity to deal with this. We are an island, and it can be fixed. If we do nothing else, we have to fix it; but I am genuinely worried, because people are traumatised,” he stated.

The manufacturing sector, which requires 24-hour shift cycles, is feeling the pinch as workers no longer wanted to work on shifts.

“In terms of the manufacturers, people don’t want to work on shifts any more. They are afraid to leave their homes. One thing is to come to work, and the other thing is to leave your kids home, with people knowing you are not there,” he explained.

The high crime results in very high security costs, which eat into companies’ bottom line, and end up being borne by the consumers.

“You are spending so much on security now and, ultimately, that passes back to the consumer. The price of goods in Jamaica is way too high. Way too high. And when you look at the components that go into it, it (security cost) is a function. Now it will be an even bigger part as a result of the court ruling, and the guards deserve it. They deserve to get what they need to get,” he told The Gleaner.

The Supreme Court ruled months ago that security guards were not independent contractors as companies have claimed for years, exploiting their services without providing them with work benefits. Guards have been denied vacation and sick leaves; they have no pension plans; and even deducted funds are often not paid to the respective government agencies.

“I feel we are in an undeclared war which no one wants to talk about. It’s them against us, and most of us have nothing to fight back. ... Our police force is the only people we have between us and dem. If we could keep crime down, you would see the benefits to the economy,” he stated.

Pandohie believes that there is too much complicity in the way we operate, and he wants his community to lend its voice more in helping the Government to solve the country’s many problems. He said the business community is generally not considered to be looking to have the interest of the ordinary people at heart.

“We are not operating as a society any more. We are operating in silos. As a person in the community we can do more. We can speak out more. We can make our money, and speak out more. We can demand more accountability, and we can be a better partner to the Government,” Pandohie said.

“I believe we can help the Government to craft plans and to be a part of the solutions, as (against) part of just being a part of the outcry. Everybody can cry out, make a comment or demand more. But the biggest contribution you can make is to be at the table, helping to craft solutions. When we look at our companies, we have to look at it not only about paying or employing people, but are we changing lives? I think we have to measure these things. I think we have to say, are we measuring these things? We have to pay people to get out, and get their children out,” he argued.

The business community is viewed as price gougers, ready to increase and reluctant to decrease. The opposite should also be practised to create harmony and not social and economic pressure and frustration, which may also lead to crime.

“I think as a business community, we need to step up and make sure that in this time, as the world looks on and says, ‘shipping cost coming down, prices coming down’, we need to make sure we do the right thing. Not only by saying it, but demonstrating it. But everybody is afraid to bell the cat, and I think that, at the end of the day, we all are there supporting the conferences (of the political parties) ... but that will always happen,” he said.

IMF POSTER CHILD

He challenged Jamaica to adopt the country approach to fix the financial sector when it went to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) after the 2011 general election.

“If you recall when former Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller went to Washington and got the IMF deal and Jamaica had no choice. That deal had to go across parties, and it didn’t matter which party was in power. Dr (Peter) Phillips went out, and Dr Nigel Clarke kept the same policy. There was an externally imposed policy that led to the kind of successes we have been having in the financial sector. It’s almost like we are going to have someone externally mandate how we will deal with the crime,” suggested the business manager.

He said crime was our problem and if it was not fixed, more of the country would be ceded to gunmen.

“Nobody will mandate that. It’s nobody else’s problem. It’s our problem, we are going to have to mandate that ourselves. Not just the business community, the whole society. We have to say ‘enough is enough’, and take it down the road ... ,” he stated, adding that he disagreed with calls for the resignations of the police commissioner and the national security minister.

“... I really disagree. It’s not the person who you put there. It’s the system,” he said.

erica.virtue@gleanerjm.com