Hanover poised for Diaspora attention
Published:Friday | May 15, 2015 | 5:48 PM
WESTERN BUREAU:
Members of the Jamaican diaspora with roots in Hanover are set to officially meet with community leaders from the parish on the final day of the upcoming sixth biennial Jamaica Diaspora Conference, which will be staged in Montego Bay, St James, next month.
The meeting, which is critical to efforts to have members of the diaspora contribute in a formal way to the development of the parish, will take place at the Social Development Commission (SDC) Complex at the Watson Taylor Park in Lucea,
According to Mashario Bisasor, the SDC parish manager for Hanover, the meeting will comprise representatives from the Community Development Committee (CDC), the Development Area Committees, and the Parish Development Committee. The aim of the meeting is to look at ways in which the diaspora can support the growth and development of rural communities and community-based enterprises in the parish.
"In June, persons from the Jamaican diaspora will be in Jamaica for the conference. Those persons - some are from Hanover and are overseas for quite a while - want to make some form of contribution to the parish," Bisasor told Western Focus during an interview in Lucea, on Thursday. "So they have contacted me, and they want to come to Watson Taylor Park to have a talk session on the 18th [of June] to see what linkages we can make as a parish with the diaspora in moving forward."
The Biennial Diaspora Conference is set for June 13-18 at the Montego Bay Convention Centre.
Bisasor said he was contacted by both Professor Kingsley Pilliam, who has roots in eastern Hanover, and Professor Dudley Morgan Jr, of the Jamaican Diaspora Canada Foundation, who asked him to assist in coordinating the meeting.
"Both of them contacted me because they wanted to take a part of the conference out of Montego Bay into the rural areas, where other persons could rap with them and see where they can help to move a rural parish forward - a rural parish close to Montego Bay," Bisasor explained.
"The session is called 'Let Us Talk'. It is like a think tank. It is a session with the leaders of local-based community," said Bisasor. "It will give the local leaders an opportunity to see how the diaspora can help local communities move forward ... and they are very much interested in the local economic initiatives that we have started with these local groups. ... They want to meet local people in their local space."