Expanding Crying Child Monument not encouragement for crime – Williams
Published:Tuesday | May 9, 2023 | 1:05 AMAinsworth Morris/Staff Reporter
Kingston Mayor Delroy Williams has rejected concerns of critics who are of the view that the Kingston and St Andrew Municipal Corporation (KSAMC) should not expand the sorrowful Crying Child Monument in downtown Kingston, so that more names of children who die under tragic circumstances can be added.
The monument, located at the intersection of Church Street and Tower Street, was erected in 2008. Engraved in it are the names of more than 2,000 children who have died tragically since 2004, but it ran out of space in 2017. It was designed by sculptor Paul Napier, and sits in a small green space.
In 2021, Town Clerk Robert Hill outlined an expansion plan for the area.
Hill said the plan was, in partnership with the Ministry of Local Government and the Child Protection Family Services Agency (CPFSA), to look at the capacity available to extend a wall of the monument. This wall would not go beyond the intersections of King Street and Tower Street, but would go to the corner where Water Lane intersects with Tower Street.
However, critics have argued that the expansion of the monument and Secret Gardens, which surrounds it, would act as encouragement to criminals to continue murdering the nation’s youth because there would be more space for names. Williams is, however, of the opposite view.
During the annual wreath-laying ceremony held at the monument on Sunday, as part of the nation’s Child Month list of activities, Williams explained his stance as to why his team will continue to make preparations for the expansion of the monument.
“We are also confused about expanding the area. The first confusion is there are people who just don’t want to face [the fact] that this may happen to other children, but I think the big vision in expanding this space is not necessarily that. It’s just to create a far better space; an aesthetically beautiful space and that will grab the attention of persons and keep the awareness going, and one day, I’m pretty sure, we will rid Jamaica of this situation, where our children are facing violence against them,” Williams said.
He also noted that the wreath-laying ceremony continued to be held to raise awareness of the tragic circumstances the nation’s youth continue to face, and to keep the memories of the lost children alive.
Williams also thanked the uniformed groups present for the guard of honour they performed and the 2023 cohort of the KSAMC’s youth council “for playing meaningful roles and contributing to this raising awareness about this issue” on Sunday.
... ‘Violence has no place in our society!’
Khijani Williams, junior council youth mayor for the KSAMC and junior councillor for the Greenwich Town division, has thrown his support behind the expansion of the Crying Child Monument and has called for violence against children in Jamaica to come to a permanent stop.
“Violence has no place in our society! Violence against children especially. When you look at this monument and you see one-year-olds, two-year-olds, it’s unacceptable... . It’s a very sad day. It’s a solemn occasion. It’s not something that I feel is celebratory, but it is something that must be done,” Williams, who took office in November last year, told The Gleaner.
“When we celebrate and recognise Child Month and when we think that part of the celebration has to involve persons looking at a situation where we are recognising children in our society who would have died in tragic situations or due to violence, it’s something in our society that we have to really sit down and think about. It’s a very sad situation and under no circumstance should we have to be recognising something like this in Jamaica,” he said.
After the wreath-laying ceremony ended on Sunday, Lionel Francis, who laid a wreath on behalf of all parents whose children were tragically killed in Jamaica over the years, briefly raised concern with a KSAMC representative about why his daughter’s name, Yetanya Francis, was only being engraved in the monument nearly five years after she was killed.