Hartley Neita, Contributor
Up to 1960, May 24, each year was celebrated as Empire Day in Jamaica as a public holiday to honour Queen Victoria who was officially credited for freeing Africans in Jamaica from slavery. That she did not was neither here or there. It was an edict imposed from our colonial master, England, and we sang songs of praise to her glory every single year.
In May 1960, a bill was presented to the House of Representatives by Norman Manley to remove Empire Day from our calendar and replace it with Labour Day. This was to commemorate the upheaval of 1938 when Jamaican workers decided they were not going to work any longer from dawn to sunset for one 'deggae' shilling. The date was changed from May 24 to May 23 at the suggestion of the JLP member for South West St Andrew Clem Tavares which was the actual date of the first wave of strikes that swept through Kingston and touched off work stoppages all across the island.
The significance of the change of date to him and his party was that Alexander Bustamante was arrested on that date in 1938 and kept in prison for days without being allowed bail.
From 1961 until 1966, the main celebrants of this public holiday were both political parties, the PNP and the JLP and their trade union arms, the NWU and the BITU. Every year, the PNP and NWU held a celebratory meeting at North Parade in Kingston and then marched through Kingston and St Andrew. The JLP and BITU marked the day with a public meeting at South Parade then marched as the PNP/NWU did. The meetings and marches showed off the strength of the organisations. Inevitably, they clashed resulting in broken skulls and bones being repaired at the Kingston Public and University hospitals.
Abhorred violence
Hugh Shearer was a man who abhorred violence and when he became prime minister in 1967 he introduced a reception at Jamaica House to bring employers and workers together to celebrate the day and which replaced the meetings and marches of the past. It did not achieve his objective. Few representatives of the PNP and NWU attended.
Five years later, Michael Manley accepted a proposal of inviting employers and workers to become involved in working together voluntarily on community social projects to demonstrate the philo-sophy of the dignity of labour. The theme of the programme was 'Put Work into Labour Day'.
Political support
Unfortunately, the Jamaica Labour Party did not support it. Speaking for the party, Edwin Allen described it "as a gimmick which rings as false as a counterfeit coin". He said that inviting people to work on this public holiday "has transformed what has been a day of celebration by the workers of Jamaica into a day or work, which diminished the significance of this annual commemoration of the struggles of the workers in 1938".
Instead, the party and trade union travelled by buses and trucks to Islington in St Mary where they had a picnic. On the way to and from Kingston, they hurled epithets at people working on community projects, describing them as "Manley's slaves".
It was not until late in the 1990s that the JLP changed its attitude and since then supporters of both parties have joined hands and hearts in working on this day.
Yesterday marked the 36th year since the programme began. It has seen scores of basic schools and homes for senior citizens built by voluntary labour on this day. Parks have been beautified. The furniture in schools have been repaired or replaced. Police stations have been painted. Private surgeons have carried out free surgeries in hospitals. Nurses have come from New York to work in our hospitals. Tourists on the north coast have joined Jamaicans working in community projects.
It is a programme unique to Jamaica. Nowhere else in the world do the people devote part or all of any public holiday in working voluntarily on community projects.
And at the end of the day, they play dominoes and skittles or party into the late hours of the night.
