After giving the Jamaican Government a royal headache in the run-up to the biennial Diaspora conference in June, the rival US-based Global Jamaica Diaspora Council (GJDC) seems to have imploded over bitter disagreements about core objectives.

It now appears that all the noisy protest demonstrations in major North American cities populated by Jamaicans, and the caustic statements embarrassing the Government, have turned out to be merely sound and fury signifying nothing but inflating the egos of the principals involved.

The dissident group has been accusing the Jamaican Government of corruption; ineptitude in handling the crime, education and health portfolios; and ignoring calls from many in the Diaspora for greater engagement with Jamaicans overseas.

While there were those who fiercely opposed the group washing Jamaica’s dirty linen in public, the cause gained traction among many influential nationals who believed governments have only wanted to use them for remittances and disaster relief support.

At the height of their powers, they shook the Government’s nerves by registering in the US as the Global Jamaica Diaspora Council, the very domain name by which the Administration engaged the Diaspora, creating all manner of confusion.

Importantly, this took place on the eve of the 10th Biennial Global Jamaica Conference, which, fortunately, came off spectacularly at Montego Bay Convention Centre in St James.

The rival group staged a counter version of the conference online at the same time, which, interestingly, drew participation from some top Opposition People’s National Party personalities who addressed conference sessions.

The two principal combatants — former Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) special agent and attorney Wilfred Rattigan and Dr Rupert Francis, co-chairs of the rival group — have been trading unhealthy barbs, which suggest it is going to be very difficult to put the organisation back together again.

Mr Francis, for his part, has threatened to sue Mr Rattigan for alleged defamation for accusations made against him after appearing to insinuate that the former FBI special agent had something to do with “breaking up the most successful and peaceful challenge to any Government of Jamaica in our pursuit of accountability”.

We in this space are not so naïve as to believe that disagreements will not come among groups, including the Church, over policy and programme approaches. Personalities will clash and pumped up egos will inflate.

But we at least expected that people seeking to represent Jamaica and Jamaicans overseas would exercise a greater deal of maturity and caution about sullying the name of our great country.

We wonder why, for example, the combatants had not sorted out the core objectives of the organisation prior to joining it and taking its activities on the street, instead of appearing to foolishly put the cart before the horse.

Of course, we are not surprised that there have also been claims of political motives behind the launch of the dissident group. These accusations have been stoutly rebuffed by the organisers, but it would hardly be a Jamaican group if partisan politics did not rear its ugly head.

We have no problems with the group wanting to secure more engagement with Government and better quality of governance. But, as always, the devil is in the details.