The vision and destiny of Jamaica

EMANCIPENDENCE BRINGS streams of reflection, strength, and vision. As I reflect on the blood, sweat, and tears of our ancestors, which paved the way for us, I feel challenged by their sacrifice, empowered by their commitment, and determined to see Jamaica fulfil her destiny.

THE CENTRALITY OF BEAUTY

This destiny has an internal and an external element. Internally, I suggest we receive the expressed idea that all Jamaicans are to operate “so that Jamaica may, under God, increase in beauty, fellowship and prosperity”. This concept of national beauty is to be naturally contrasted with the uglies of violence, perversion, and corruption. That we “under God, increase in beauty” is the linchpin upon which fellowship and prosperity stand. It is our first mission and the principle around which we must organise our nation. To the extent that we fail to do so, Jamaica fails. Our ability to retain the knowledge of what is right, decry that which is evil and defend the truth in our society against local and global infestation will determine whether we remain emancipated and independent. If we are assimilated as a spoke in another nation’s runaway wheel or/and drink of our own Kool-Aid of locally branded totalitarianism, chaos, and perversion, in either case, we would be a failed democracy, a rampantly corrupt society, an ugly godless nation.

THE MISSION OF OUR PEOPLE

It is the responsibility of all Jamaicans to steward this vision, but especially those who can tell the difference between that which is beautiful and horrendous. There are those who cannot tell their right hand from their left. Surely the nation cannot be left in their hands. But even if they manage to have political power, the masses that retain the ability to know good from evil must be gatekeepers and the conscience of the nation, and shamelessly so. Those who occupy positions of leadership in this nation who are ruled by selfish ambition, greed, or nihilism must feel the unquenchable thirst for the increase in beauty in our nation.

THE IMPERATIVE OF VIGILANCE

The price of emancipendence is eternal vigilance. As such, we must reflect on the 2017 ruling by the Supreme Court against the IDB-funded national identification system of that year which restrained the government from oppressing our people. We must never forget the exorbitant increases in the salaries of parliamentarians which both political parties agreed to while poverty abounds. We must take note of the moves of our Government to defend our nation from the imposition of foreign nationals on our values related to marriage in the recent diplomatic spat. But also the unresponsiveness of our Government to the insult of the flying of the LGBT flags at the US and Canadian embassies even during Emancipendence celebrations.

We must be conscious of the trivialisation and disregard that our government meted out against the most important document in this nation, the Jamaican Constitution, as it relates to the office of the director of public prosecutions. These events and more stress the imperative of the vigilance of the people of Jamaica in the face of glimpses of autocracy, cultural colonialism, and systems of global control that are actively recruiting nations as lab rats for social and economic experimentation.

As we celebrate we must also defend our emancipendence and guard our freedoms from forces, foreign and domestic, that would seek to neutralise that which has been accomplished for us and would also seek to derail Jamaica from the fullness of her destiny. This destiny in its most mature form is also external: “to play her part in advancing the welfare of the whole human race.”

Dr Daniel Thomas is president of the Love March Movement.