garrisons: murder, poverty, politics: 'Anatomy of crime not understood'
published:
Sunday | June 1, 2008
baugh
CHAIRMAN OF the governing Jamaica Labour Party (JLP), Dr Ken Baugh, is rejecting claims that political will is lacking in the fight against crime.
"That is not a true statement at all," Baugh, who is the country's deputy prime minister, tells The Sunday Gleaner.
Commissioner of Police Rear Admiral Hardley Lewin and Police Federation chairman Corporal Raymond Wilson, among others, have pointed to a lack of political will as a hindrance to crime fighting.
However, according to Baugh: "The political will has been there from the beginning. What is happening is that people don't understand the anatomy of crime."
Just under 200 persons were murdered last month alone and close to 700 since January, prompting calls for Government to articulate and have an anti-crime plan implemented.
Crime reduction is highlighted in the JLP's manifesto as "a national imperative". The transformation of political garrisons was among a five-point measure articulated by the party leading up to the September 3 general election last year.
degarrisonisation
Subsequent to the publishing of that manifesto, the JLP's Road Map to a Safe and Secure Jamaica, a study conducted by a team led by Colonel Trevor MacMillan, who is now the minister of national security, called for the degarrisonisation of communities. Nearly three-quarters of the murders so far this year have been committed in communities identified as political garrisons, prompting an increase in the call for de-garrisonising communities. 'Political garrisons', a term coined by late professor of political sociology, Carl Stone, describes communities that are allied electorally, to one of the country's main political parties, and where open dissension is frowned on.
The JLP chairman rejects claims of a link between criminals and politicians, saying that even if this existed in the past, it is no longer the case.
no criminals in politics
"It may have happened in the past when the county was polarised and sharply divided. That is not the case now. It has to do more with the fact that young people, and older folks, young adults really, have no anchor in life," Baugh says.
He adds: "Politicians, like everybody else, are not any special kind of people. They are people coming out of our society like the police officers. The critical mass of people who get involved in politics are there to assist with solutions.
"I am not saying that there are no criminals in politics, because it is an open field and people can get involved. We do our best to screen the people who get involved and to screen the support that comes to us."
The JLP chairman says that solving crime will not happen overnight, but would involve improving the socio-economic conditions of all Jamaicans, particularly the poor.
"The only thing that is going to solve the problem is good, hard policing, community police work, community activities on the part of politicians and officers of the Government, and the creating of opportunities,"argues Baugh.
