The Jamaican Civil War

I have no doubt that former Minister of Security K.D. Knight told the present Minister of Justice Dorothy Lightbourne in 1980 that "All labourite fid dead." I believe her not only because that profile fits the public persona that we know as K. D. Knight, but also during that period, members of the hierarchy of the People's National Party and the Jamaica Labour Party, were arming poor people to kill each other. That is why the 1980 elections are recorded more as being an informal civil war than an election.

During that period, some 800 mostly poor Jamaicans were killed by their own poor brothers who just happened to support another political party. It is also well accepted that the people who actually pulled the trigger were just not in the financial position to buy the sophisticated guns and weapons that were used to commit murder in the name of politics.

This is seething sore that remains in the underbelly of the Jamaican body politic, which, until it is dealt with some form of truth and reconciliation hearing to cleanse our souls, will never be healed in this poor unfortunate nation of ours.

Our problems as a nation and especially the issue of crime, do not lie with the poor but with the educated middle class which have forever been pulling the strings in the dark while great honour is heaped on their heads in the public arena.