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February 25, 2025
JFJ: In search of a just cause
If any further evidence was needed to justify the Jamaica Baptist Union’s (JBU) relaunch of its Salt Spring Peace and Justice Centre in St James over the weekend, we need look no further than Sunday’s senseless killing of two women in Mandeville, Manchester.
Both events were carried in Monday’s edition of this newspaper and — when taken together with the comments by Jamaicans for Justice (JFJ), former Prime Minister Bruce Golding and Police Commissioner Dr Kevin Blake on police killing of civilians — demonstrate the painful impact of crime on our country.
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They should also make it clear to our trifling, pettifogging politicians why, despite their high-sounding words after every murder and reciting of statistics, crime remains among the top issues for our people.
Twelve years ago, the JBU launched — but soon after abandoned — its grand plan to establish peace and justice centres in volatile communities nationwide, using violence-torn Salt Spring as the pilot site.
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According to general secretary of the JBU Rev Merlyn Hyde Riley, the centre was to serve as “a sanctuary where community members could access conflict resolution, mediation training, and peace-building resources”. Imagine what good it could have done had the idea received the vigorous support of our politicians.
Such a centre might have proven to be pivotal in preventing the slaying of the Mandeville women and injuring of three other people, including a child, at a candlelight vigil, in what started as an alleged dispute over the collision of two motor vehicles — absolutely no reason for anyone being shot to death.
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We hope that this time the JBU will be successful in again marshalling the support of the initial partners which included the Salt Spring Baptist Church, St James Baptist Association, the Peace Management Initiative, and Citizen Security and Justice Programme.
Critical support was lent by the Jamaica Constabulary Force for its youth summer programmes, grief support initiatives, literacy and numeracy training, and health and wellness fairs, in collaboration with community service agencies. Importantly, the centre also worked alongside peace organisations to deliver violence prevention and crime reduction strategies.
This kind of work, had it been sustained, might also have prevented the police from having the dubious distinction of killing 50 civilians in 50 days, something we know Commissioner Blake and Mr Golding both regret. We in this space do too.
Indeed, JFJ, but for the fact that it has to justify its funding from overseas, might have been more analytical in its cautionary statement which failed to recognise that such bloodshed would not have come easy to our embattled policemen and women.
Dr Blake makes a serious point that JFJ misses: “To suggest that fatal shooting numbers can be reduced by anything other than the unwillingness of persons being apprehended to engage in deadly confrontations with members of the security forces is irresponsible, or at best advocating for us to relent in our pursuit.”
Mr Golding, too, is correct in noting that JFJ had not cited one instance of what appeared as an extrajudicial killing, and should, for its own credibility, do more than sound the alarm at the number of reported killings by the police.
JFJ might wish to assist the JBU in operationalising the peace and justice centres.
