- FileAn individual runs across a deserted street in West Kingston during the July 7-10 disturbances involving the security forces and gunmen.
Patricia Watson, Senior Staff Reporter
SIX killed in the city in one day", "Gun violence claims three more in Mountain View", "Infants killed in gang war", "Police Station bombed", "Police shot and injured during shoot-out with gunmen". These represent only a small fraction of the blood-letting that has been taking place in the country since the start of the year.
Hundreds of people in Jamaica and more so the inner city, are being killed for reasons which appear vague to most of us.
We no longer seem to see ourselves as Jamaicans, but pieces in a game where people earn marks for killing each other. At the rate and bare-faced way in which crimes are being committed in Jamaica, it would appear that criminals have taken control of the country. And those of us, who are law-abiding seem to have willingly surrendered ourselves to this 'reality'.
Since the start of the year, several interventions - Inner-city Renewal Programme and the Crime Management Unit, to name two - have been made to curb the flow of blood and the pain and sufferings of those directly affected. But these programmes have had little success and the murder and violence continues unabated.
Based on the inability of past projects in violence-prone areas to bring about stability and development, scepticism may well be the order of the day. However, something needs to be done to address the crime and justice situation in the country and this is what the Citizens' Security and Justice Programme (CSJP) seeks to do.
Nine inner-city communities - Drewsland, Denham Town, Hannah Town, Waterhouse, Trench Town, Grants Pen, Tower Hill, Fletchers Land and August Town - will benefit from the US$20.6 million programme in the first instance. One can only hope that the violence does not obliterate us all by the time it is implemented in February 2002.
Components
The CSJP is divided into five inter-related components. These are, the development of a national strategy for combating crime. Under this component, a consultancy service will develop a National Crime and Violence Prevention Strategy, which will form the blueprint for future crime and violence reduction activities. Attempts will also be made to strengthen the capacity of the Ministries of National Security and Justice to deal with crime and violence. Strengthening of the Criminal Justice System is another area that will be tackled, placing emphasis on the Police Public Complaints Authority, the Victim Support Programme, Correctional Services and the Court system.
Perhaps the most refreshing of the components laid out by the consultants working within the CSJP is the community action segment. Unlike many of the failed programmes that were implemented in the past, they seem to recognise the fact that crime and violence cannot be solved without the participation of those directly involved. If the people in the communities do not see the necessity to change, then change cannot be forced on them from outside.
Oftentimes, one of the most glaring mistakes made by both Government and NGOs interventions in the inner city is the total neglect of the views of those they are claiming to help. In addition, many of the projects are carried out in a vacuum, without private sector participation. It is this blinkered view of solving crime and poverty which has contributed to prolonging many of the major problems in the communities, such as their dependence on handouts, whether from the dons or NGOs or Government itself.
Community Action Co-ordinator, Orville Simmons, explained that much ground work was done in the communities to gauge residents views on their communities, crime and violence and the way forward.
"(Community) leaders were seen as important, however one could see some ambivalence in these community mechanisms," Mr. Simmons explained.
According to him, members in some of the communities felt that the 'dons' were too powerful and wanted a new and different approach to governance. He said there was some implication that people "want to get out of the donmanship business, (but) there was another voice which says the area leaders are performing a necessary role."
As such, the NGOs that will be working within the communities will have a hard job on their hand balancing the need to lessen the grip of area 'dons' on the community while working closely with them to ensure progress.
"Activities are demand driven, it is what the community says it wants and based on further consultation with communities. It is the community that will decide what services it wants and if it does not want a particular programme, it will not be done," Mr. Simmons told The Sunday Gleaner.
Despite this claim and despite the findings of the researchers from the Planning Institute of Jamaica (PIOJ), the programme will not deal with some of the major areas which the communities feel engender crime and violence. These are job opportunities and housing.
According to the co-ordinators, there are NGOs involved in these areas in the communities already and they will not seek to duplicate work that is already under way, but will work to enhance these.
Programme manager, Simeon Robinson, pointed out that one of the major shortfalls of interventions in the inner city is the total focus on social programmes and a neglect of economic ones.
"What we are trying to do is to link both together, for instance we are not providing direct employment, but we at least know of employable skills and have put in place plans to network these skills which the private sector and Government needs," Mr. Robinson said.
Campaign
The CSJP will also involve the implementation of a social marketing and public education campaign. Under this component, residents of the aforementioned communities will benefit from programmes designed to foster positive attitudinal change, reduce the social acceptance of violence and the promotion of peace among communities.
The business community will also be targeted in order to break down the perceptions held that people from the crime and violence-prone communities are all criminals. Mr. Robinson noted that members of the private sector will be invited to participate in the programme "in the hope that by working with the programme, they will buy into it."
In addition, the NGOs which will be working in the communities will not only just provide services, but will train local people in order to sustain the gains made.
It would be good if the CSJP is able to accomplish all it has set out on paper, as residents of the communities must be tired of programmes starting and ending without achieving anything tangible. Residents themselves also need to start showing that they too are tired of the crime and violence and poverty. It is not enough for them to claim they want to change when they are doing nothing to effect this. It will be an uphill battle to re-socialise many in the inner city, which is why an integrated approach involving the private sector and Government is needed. If the Government and private sector are not committed to playing a major role, then gangs and 'dons' will continue to fill the gap.
