Two years ago, on a September morning, I was driving to the A and E of the University Hospital of the West Indies. In one of the passenger seats behind me was a 75-year-old man who was clutchinghis belly because parts of it were spilling out of...
On June 5, 1995, Bruce Golding was close to the end of his first go-around as a JLP MP. In that capacity, he had been asked by the Secretary to the Joint Select Committee on Constitutional and Electoral Reform to sign that committee’s report...
On the death of the Queen of England, my family recalled with some irony the jingle we learned when we were children: CALL: When the queen died? RESPONSE: She died last night! CALL: She leave any money? RESPONSE: She leave 10 pounds. CALL: Mary...
As the African Union celebrates its 20-year anniversary, the acceleration of the partnership between Africa and the Caribbean has come to the fore. Afro-Caribbean relations date back to the infamous epoch of the Trans-Atlantic slave trade, which...
On July 28, The Gleaner published a report on statements made by former Prime Minister Bruce Golding under the heading “‘We have messed up”. He, essentially, pointed fingers at “successive administrations” that failed to advance Jamaica’s interests...
Political parties enjoy their best times when they win governmental power. They also can afford to accept the accolades from the media and those in other influential sectors of the country who find it convenient to shower them with praises. At...
An African proverb notes that: “When two elephants fight, it is the grass underneath that suffers.” The fact that 52 governments from the “global South” failed to condemn Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February, and 82 Southern states refused to...
Y’all knew it was just a matter of time before I returned to the urgent need for constitutional reform. This time I’ll try to be as quiet as possible while presenting views on the subject of two former prime ministers expressed in writing almost 30...
About six months after the election win it is not only safe to throw off the hangover of the victory but reality must give way to political promises foolishly made. A return to power for the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) in September 2020 would have...
Today we pay tribute to the freedom fighters who ensured the decolonisation of Ayiti, a country whose struggle against colonialism has influenced the declaration of UNESCO’s “International Day” for the remembrance of the transatlantic trafficking...
The announcement of the death of Elizabeth II, Sovereign Queen of several realms, including seven in the Caribbean, plunged the world into deep sadness. She was not Queen in the far-flung countries in which millions of people now mourn her death,...
So what is love? Geraldine Jones used to define love flippantly (see what I did there?). She would say “Love is a feeling you feel when you’re about to feel a feeling you never felt before!” Cute but wrong. Love isn’t a feeling. It’s a process. It...
“We shall only demolish if the court instructs us to do so,” responded Mayor of Kingston and St Andrew Delroy Williams to my question posed at the Citizens-Rights-to-the-City meeting held with the Kingston and St Andrew Municipal Corporation (KSAMC...
The Jamaica Forum for Lesbians, All-Sexuals and Gays (J-FLAG) has found reason to disagree with recent findings of a Don Anderson poll that found that 80 per cent of Jamaicans are against removing or changing the buggery law. According to a news...
The Climate Cultures conference held in Berlin from August 26-28 (https://www.climate-cultures-festival.de/en.program.html), was almost three years in the planning. It was, therefore, surreal when Esther Figueroa and I were finally sitting on the...
Now might be a good time to consider going solar. The price of energy is skyrocketing. It is happening all over the world – at petrol pumps and on electricity bills. The war in Ukraine has caused unprecedented hikes in the cost of oil and natural...
The current Premier League Political Football game is all about teacher migration. Government has carried the ball up field rapidly from (paraphrase) “a no nutten. It happen every year” to PM’s latest description as “a threat to our ability to...
With recent high-level visits to Africa by the foreign ministers of Russia and the United States – Sergey Lavrov and Antony Blinken – it is critical that the continent define its own vision of a post-Ukraine world. Africa must focus on concrete...
“… Among some of the organised methods used to control the world is the thing known and called ‘propaganda’…” said Marcus Mosiah Garvey, who would have been 135 years old on August 17. Dr Lauren Marsh, in his 2022 Marcus Garvey Memorial Lecture at...
Marronage, or the process of fleeing enslavement, had been a reality from the early days of European colonising of the Western Hemisphere. It is in no way surprising that people would seek to escape enslavement and all the human exploitation that...
On June 8, 2022, BBC reporters Emery Makumeno and Cecilia Macauly detailed the official visit of King Philippe of the Belgians to the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DR Congo) in a piece titled “Belgian Royals in DR Congo: King Philippe Laments...
Two Wednesdays ago, I was disappointed at seeing two primary schools competing on a TV quiz programme. It seemed to me that the fates of society and the education sector had conspired against these eager, well-meaning young children. The final...
On August 1, Emancipation Day, I went to look at the Rio Cobre, which had suffered a devastating fish kill on July 30 -31 due to an effluent release from the bauxite-alumina refinery at Ewarton, currently owned by UC Rusal. By the time I got there...
World Senior Citizen’s Day is celebrated on August 21 each year. The day is intended to recognise the achievements of the elderly and also increase awareness of the factors and issues that affect them, such as health deterioration and abuse....
The music and the dance around a politician follow the standard choreography. Just before elections, they spread the news that new promises are floating in the air. In fact, most are empty. Many are words poorly thought out. After the win, let the...
