In Focus
Despite most of us having no clue where the time went it seems another new year is upon us. The thing about time is that it not only flies but changes direction, fortunes and perspectives while doing so. Time is multi faceted. And relentless. For...
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Jamaica has agreed to a number of international agreements that bind it to providing an accessible and inclusive environment for persons with disabilities. The United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD) and the...
Jamaica’s prolonged mistreatment of Haitian migrants is often defended in the language of capacity, sovereignty, or political realism. Yet five years on — and now brutally exposed by Hurricane Melissa (a manmade weapon of mass destruction without...
Hurricane Melissa’s vastly different human and infrastructural impact between eastern and western Jamaica has continued into the early recovery stages. There is another, far less obvious, disaster divide that is affecting some of the most...
In many ways, it has to be more than just what you feel about me and significantly deeper than that. It has to be much more than that. I want to feel an intense connection. Closer than it could ever be. Somewhat more tender than anything could ever...
“… I will uncover your skirts over your face, That your shame may appear …” was spoken by God to the prophet Jeremiah about ancient Israel. Is this exposure applicable to post-disaster Jamaica? Hurricane Melissa making landfall on October 28...
The Maroons are a distinct but divided people. Some Maroons find their national identity through full membership of Jamaican society as Jamaican nationals, engaging in Jamaican cultural life, sharing as Jamaicans in the pleasures and pains of...
Drone footage and satellite images taken after Hurricane Melissa revealed a landscape littered with wreckage - trees stripped bare, vegetation ripped from the ground, roofing sheets, doors, windows, furniture, bedding, and every possible object...
The arrival of 117 Canadian electrical linesmen to assist the Jamaica Public Service Company (JPS) in restoring power after Hurricane Melissa has been greeted with official smiles, airport photo-ops, and an oddly incurious media tone. We are told...
This comes with the most bold-faced audacity; The Jamaica Public Service (JPS) claiming seven per cent increase in electricity rates. What makes this so jarring to the nerves is what went down before. As I previously stated, JPS is 80 per cent...
When the winds died down and the floodwaters receded, what remained was not only broken infrastructure, but broken routines, broken security and broken peace of mind. And yet, our recovery discourse still treats mental health as secondary, optional...
Some time ago you either bought or were gifted, probably by a spouse or parent, a different type of telephone. It was shaped like a half oval. It wasn’t attached to the wall. It could fit in your pocket. All you had to do was flip it open, punch in...
Trinidad and Tobago (T...
Driving into West Green, Montego Bay, the damage from Hurricane Melissa even a month later was still unmistakable. Dried mud crusted the roadway and, in front of almost every house were piles of damaged furniture, appliances, and mattresses -...
So, last week ( A very Private Public Service) I complained about the reaction to my critique of the JPS “loan”. I wrote: “….I’m told to shut up because I’m safe in Kingston and don’t feel what western-based Jamaicans feel.... Based on this puerile...
Jamaica’s public procurement system was built to protect taxpayers and ensure value for money. But, alongside these strengths sits a stubborn problem: delay. Too often, our own rules slow us down, dulling the impact of the very projects designed to...
