On November 1, 2010, a piece that I wrote for The Gleaner ‘Don’t dehumanise prisoners’ was inspired by my conversations with an ex-convict, a retired correctional officer, and an official from the Ministry of Justice. I was, and still am, very...
Human rights defenders and organisations such as Jamaicans for Justice (JFJ) often face backlash from politicians and citizens alike. Criticisms from well-intended citizens tend to be fuelled by fear, frustration and a misunderstanding of what is...
It is especially good news to hear of a “noticeable reduction” in trash along parts of Jamaica’s coastline, as was recently reported by Jamaica Environment Trust (JET). This reduction comes off the back of years of campaigning and advocacy by JET...
There is an alarming surge in gun-related violence, particularly among younger people and gangs. This plague has now spread from other parts of the Caribbean into Antigua and Barbuda, which has recently suffered a spike in gun crimes. Throughout my...
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) told us that what we were going to see earlier this week, on Monday night, was a “full moon which was a supermoon blue moon”. What made it worse for me was talk about the “full” moon and “...
The results of the local government elections last February confirmed the findings of opinion polls that the political fortunes of the ruling Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) had fallen and were falling. They lost the popular vote, and were it a general...
So, as it turns out, while Jamaican teachers are leaving the country in droves for employment in the United States, Canada, Japan and other developed economies, Jamaica has managed to attract teaching talent from countries like Cuba, Ghana and the...
The Jamaica Teachers’ Association (JTA) has a peculiar leadership structure. It elects its next president a year ahead of time, just ahead of the inauguration of the person who will lead the organisation during the president-elect’s waiting...
Mark Smith’s claim that the test to assess the education achievements of Jamaica’s primary school is off the rails, leading to burnout among students, must not be rejected out of hand by the island’s education authorities. Instead, the conclusion...
IN RECENT years, Jamaica’s national security issues have been dominated by lottery scamming, and the greed, violence, gang warfare, and murder that it fuels. For years, the entire country has been held hostage by the fight over lead sheets, fake...
THERE MUST be a concern on the part of some who were traditionally dominant in the sports arena that there is now emerging a preponderance of ‘coloured’ athletes in just about every discipline imagined. The last football World Cup was more than...
Either Daryl Vaz is engaged in political theatre or the Government has lost faith in the six highly respected and accomplished Jamaicans who were appointed to regulate the island’s public utilities. Or the minister doesn’t have a clear grasp of...
Vice-President Kamala Harris has taken a strong six-point lead in American public opinion polls over her frenetic opponent Donald Trump. The ABC News-Washington Post August 9-13 poll puts Harris at 51 per cent to Trump’s 45 per cent. This is truly...
The Caribbean Forum (CARIFORUM) of the Organization of African, Caribbean and Pacific States (OACPS) now has a new chair. Barbados, it is understood, assumed that post as of July 1. The chair should be the Hon Kerrie Symmonds, MP, Minister of...
Politicians have earned a reputation for being dishonest, although, to be fair, we all lie. However, Donald Trump may very well be the most dishonest presidential candidate the United States (US), or any other country, has ever seen. Indeed,...
By the end of October, a little less than two and a half months from now, Jamaica’s local government authorities are, by law, to submit to the national minister their budgets for the next fiscal year, beginning April 2025. They include the...
From our comfortable armchairs in front of the television we rant and rave when our athletes fail to meet our unrealistic expectations. But as the great Herb McKenley once reminded us, “Brilliant execution (in athletics) is only part of the story....
Just asking: why would anyone join a gang when the fate of being “fatally arrested “or put “before their Maker” is increasingly likely as senior policemen and our prime minister have mandated? Not many people need fear being brought before a real...
August 19 to 25 is observed as annual cardiopulmonary week. The aim of this initiative by Heart Foundation of Jamaica is to educate and advocate for cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) in the general population. Statistics from the US indicate...
If we understand Prime Minister Andrew Holness correctly, building a modern maximum security prison is not a top priority of his administration. Mr Holness has two concerns. One is cost. Prisons are expensive. So, constructing one now would divert...
I used to travel when I was a student, and during the course of those travels it became easier for me to identify Jamaica to foreigners. I recall in 1970s, amid wars and tension in Algeria, I had the opportunity to visit Ghardaïa, one of five ksour...
This newspaper celebrates with the residents of Richmond Park, St Andrew, what is a rare victory for communities, of having the city’s local government halt an unauthorised development of a used car dealership in the area. We also note the...
CHAKA-CHAKA SPELLING Inna March 1923, di Kingston Division fi di Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA) buy one building a 76 King Street fi dem headquarters. Ascorden to di website fi Liberty Hall: The Legacy of Marcus Garvey, “it...
If one has ever spent quality time with homicide investigators or frontline police officers, pursuing criminal elements on operations, it would be easy to understand their discomfort, when well-thinking, enraged and outraged members of the...
Despite decades of gang-related and reprisal killings, despite the hundreds of lives lost to ‘senseless violence’ annually, and cumulative tens of thousands of lives brutally extinguished over decades, it took the shock of the octuple murder (a...
