Vernon Daley

Let me say straight off that I like listening to Bruce Golding. He's learned, articulate and possesses an uncommon skill to reduce even the most complex matters into language ordinary people can understand.

He doesn't have the charisma that Jamaicans so love but still manages to do a fine job in getting his message across. But the irony of life isthat we're often undone by our very talents.

Last week I listened to some snippets of the Opposition Leader's contribution to the Parliamentary debate on reparations for slavery and I found him guilty of intellectualising the issue to death.

In what, at times, seemed like a lecture in international law, Mr. Golding spoke about the pitfalls that could prevent a successful claim for reparations against European nations.

Chief among his many concerns was that this would be the first time reparations would be claimed against nations rather than individuals. He was also exercised by the legal difficulty of constructing the case when the original perpetrators of slavery have long since departed us and are therefore incapable of answering the claim.

But having painted a gloomy picture, Mr. Golding then went on to state that he still felt it possible for the peoples affected by slavery to get reparations for this undoubted human tragedy. Insofar as I could determine the Opposi-tion Leader did not have strong views one way or the other. This is a great pity for people generally like when their leaders have a clear and straightforward position.

I doubt many would have been impressed, on this occasion, by the academic approach adopted by the Opposition Leader. If Mr. Golding supports reparations then he should climb to the mountain top and say so and leave us in no doubt that he would fight that fight to the bitter end to see justice done. If he is incapable of that, then silence is golden.

Crazy ideas

The fear of crime has a way of driving otherwise sensible people into the embrace of crazy ideas. Last week an Opposition Senator in Trinidad and Tobago, Harry Mungalsingh, went and got himself fired for suggesting that the government should introduce cash-induced abortion and sterialisation as a way of fighting crime in some of the country's hot spots.

It's a foolish suggestion which-ever way it's spun. But it also smacks of racism when it is considered that Mr. Mungalsing is of East Indian descent and the targets of his nefarious scheme would be predominately Afro-Trinidadians, living in depressed, crime-ridden communities.

At least the Opposition United National Congress had the good sense to act quickly in distancing itself from that backward thinking.

More CCJ disappointment

President of the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) Michael de la Bastide has again voiced his disappointment about the fact that only Barbados and Guyana have so far joined onto the appellate jurisdiction of the court. This time he makes his feelings known in the CCJ's first annual report, published recently.

It is, indeed, a tragedy for these poor countries in the region to be pouring so much money into an institution without utilising it. The US$100 million it cost to set up the court is nothing to sneeze at.

Jamaica remains in limbo about the CCJ yet it's saddled with nearly 30 per cent of the cost. We need a decision on this sooner rather than later. This is good money going down the drain.