Kern Spencer Released

Today the nation was shocked to hear that justice Pusey had ruled that former junior minister Kern Spencer had no case to answer in the Cuban Light Bulb scandal and released him.

This is the most scandalous ruling I can recall ever hearing  in the history of the corrupt Jamaican justice system  but I can't say I WAS PARTICULARLY SURPRISED  as I had bet an attorney that this would have been the outcome, considering the clear dislike the judge had  displayed for the director of public Prosecutions and the most unusual steps she took to get her off the case and show her who was boss!

Interestingly, recent polls  have shown that some 6% of Jamaicans have admitted to bribing judges. I wonder  are the judges that they bribed??

History

Spencer, the member of parliament for North East St Elizabeth, is accused of acting improperly when, as state minister in the energy ministry, under the People's National Party Govern-ment, he exercised control over the distribution of free energy-saving light bulbs given to Jamaica by the government of Cuba.

The project had cost $276 million to be implemented but the contractor general and the police later found a number of suspected irregularities in the awarding of contracts.

The Jamaican Government was required to meet the cost of clearance, storage and delivery of the bulbs, as well as the transportation and accommodation of 300 Cuban volunteers to install the bulbs.
Contractor General Greg Christie, who conducted a probe into the project, said Spencer had hand-picked Universal Management and Development Company Ltd (UMD) to undertake the distribution of the bulbs. UMD was incorporated just about the time the delivery of the bulbs commenced in 2006.
Businessman Rodney Chin is the chief shareholder and director in UMD, as well as Caribbean Communication Media Network Ltd., which the Government paid more than $3.3 million under the project.

Sherine Shakes, who was the project manager at UMD, is the mother of one of Spencer's children. Shakes' mother, Verdie Mair, was also involved in the project. She is listed as company secretary for UMD. The contractor general has said she was also paid for catering services under the project.

Tapioka Again

Yesterday was an absolutely great day of healthy exercise, beautiful sites and sounds and wonderful camaraderie as once again we took the road to Tapioka in St. Mary. 

I rode to Castleton and decided to join the some twenty hikers who had joined us, as i wanted to capture some of the great sights in the picturesque Junction area. unfortunately, when I got to Castleton and looked in the vehicle that I had put my bag containing my camera, I heard to my horror that the bag had already gone off to Tapioca in another vehicle and the hikers had already left. It was therefore left to Gail to drive myself and Micky Chuck to catch up the walkers.

When we saw Sheila (my cousin from Canada) we came out of the vehicle and joined her. It was a nice, easy walk to Tapioka through super beautiful countryside where slender, green bamboos, fruit trees and flowers proliferate.

Despite his recent accident, Barry, our safety officer,  drove over to spend the day with us as did Jewel, her daughter Brianna and Brian Case. Michelle Lowe who has been missing in action for months, also rode over.

We were the last of the walkers and Desiree is so fit that she jogged past us then after reaching her destination, jogged back to make sure we were ok .

Another super fit person who also followed that routine was an Indian Doctor from the Chest Hospital who was travelling with us form the first time.

When we got to Tapioka, we saw Raquel holding exercise classes at the entrance for the super fit ones who had gotten there long before.

The food at the venue was very good, especially the run dung and hot chocolate, then it was off to the river to frolic.

While we opted for the swimming area in the  Ugly river  by the Devon Pen bridge, which despite the drought had enough depth for excellent swimming, some people chose the Wag Water which was quite shallow while the RIBIS who were riding back to either Castleton or Kingston, never even stopped for a swim .

They don't know what they missed as the water was cool and refreshing. Some of whom stayed behind did not walk on the road to the Ugly river but instead came over the very steep hill with a guide, but having done that the first time we went and finding that hill quite challenging,I had just walked on the main road with  Sheila.

After a wonderful swim and frolic, we drove back to Kingston with Chuck and a number of us met up at Castleton to ensure that the lady who makes the Delicious janga soup did not have anything left in her pot  to lug home!

When we returned to Kingston., I was soaked by a heavy and sudden downpour but amazingly not a drop of rain  fell at my home but as they say, the rain falls on the just on the unjust so I guess I must be in the latter category!.

JOAN WILLIAMS, co-host of JUSTICE on POWER 106, describes herself as an unapologetic addict to the Jamaican outdoors. A foundation member of FUN AND THRILLS ADVENTURE CLUB, she explores the island at any given opportunity cycling, hiking or swimming with that group, family, Jah 3 and anyone else who will have her. In 1995, she published the popular TOUR JAMAICA and the 4^th edition is now an ebook available at;

http://www.amazon.com/Tour-Jamaica-Joan-Williams-ebook/dp/B00EJWCSHS/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1389464644&sr=8-1&keywords=tour+jamaica+by+joan+williams

Contact; gratestj@gmail.com

Bias versus Coldbloodedness

It is absolutely amazing how the Member of Parliament for western Kingston, Desmond Mckenzie  can be accusing Velma Hyton, former Counsel to the 2002 commission of inquiry into events at Tivoli Gardens in 2002, which led to the death of some 27 persons, of only bias.

This arose from Hylton saying in 2002,  'In my respectful submission, if the women and children deliberately put themselves between the law-and-order forces ... to enable those gunmen behind them to fire at the security forces and to fire at civilians, I for one, do not understand why, in all circumstances, they cannot return the fire.'

Now that Hylton has been appointed as one of the Commissioners to look into events in 2010 in that same area, which led to the death of perhaps, in excess of 100 persons, some 42 of whom the Public defender said were executed., there is no doubt in my mind that Ms. Hylton is far too cold to be considered for this Commission especially as it was reported elsewhere that some of the kids ranged from ages 6 and 12! For do kids of that age fully understand the implications of life and death and even where they do, did they have a say into whether they were to become human shields or not? As to the women, has Ms. Hylton ever heard of excessive force?

Quite, frankly, I think Ms. Hylton would have even made the blood of the British in 1865, run cold, for as history tells us, they did not take kindly to Governor Eyre's excessive force in the Morant Bay rebellion, especially after a soldier admitted, "we slaughtered all before us… man or woman or child".

On the other hand, George Zimmerman was recently invited to a gun show to sign autographs.

 Maybe Ms. Hylton will be similarly celebrated one day!

SLOW PACE OF CHANGE

One of the most wasteful and stupid practices of successive Jamaican governments is to establish a new agency to deal with every new problem.

So taxpayers are forever saddled with several agencies overlapping each other and despite the fact that the country is now scraping the proverbial barrel to try and ward off insolvency, the logic of amalgamating agencies continues to evade us.

So it is with this in mind that I overwhelmingly welcome the move to finally amalgamate the JCF and ISCF (blue stripe and red stripe police) 20 years after it was recommended by the Wolfe Task force on crime! Is this a sign that we are finally coming to our senses?

I doubt it very much, for no where have I heard that anyone wants to restructure that expensive relic of colonialism, the army, to serve the best interests of the Jamaican people, so I suppose that we will continue to waste billions on  that deadly institution  for centuries to come, although we have no empire to protect. (Could they protect us from an invasion from Cayman anyway? I doubt it!)

What purpose does a fully fledged army serve? Sure we need a coast guard, an air wing and an engineering corp but shouldn't the thousands who make up the infantry be offered the opportunity to be retrained to serve and protect the people of Jamaica via the police force? Right now, these men have very little to do except act as bat men  for the  officer corp and occasionally, although they are not trained to do police work, they are sent in to terrorize people in the inner-cities.

 It is  pathetic to see these healthy young men being trained at Newcastle and no one would even think of giving them some paint and lumber to fix up their quarters there which is slowly but surely crumbling.  Then after they are trained, they are wasted at camp. Such blatant under-utilization of human capital.

While we waste money and peoples lives on a redundant army, Costa Rica, situated in the midst of turmoil in Centrral America, abolished theirs in 1947 and diverted the resources to education. No wonder their per capita income is almost twice ours and the last time I visited there about two years ago, a friend was able to boast that they do not do manual labour but import Nicaraguans to do all their "dirty work."

Oh how thousands of our Jamaicans would love to  get an opportunity to go there and do their "dirty work" while our governments continue to operate as a "one eye men in blind man country."

That Enfield Ride

A few weeks ago, I accompanied Charles 1st, (a St. Mary man, as is Alrick) Fatman and Ayatollah to check out a new outing with a distance of approximately 37 miles, which could accommodate not only riders but hikers as well.

The scouts

This was to Enfield in St. Mary, a district south east of Annotto Bay in St. Mary where around four different rivers converge. We selected as our destination Bridge 41, snugly situaated beneath the mist covered mountains which would also give us access to the Dry  and  May rivers.

I have no idea why it is called the Dry river for as Howie and I reminisced about the hash we did there with Jah 3 a few years ago, I had to laugh remembering how expensive that hash had proven to be for me. For I had slipped on a rock and fell into the "Dry river"  getting my two cell phones wet and both proved to be unfix-able!

The dry river

I recall at that time too, asking several residents why it was called the Dry river and if they had ever seen it dry, but none had. Anyway, yesterday riding along the roadway, we noticed a huge sand mining operation close to the Northcoast highway and have since assumed that they Dry river goes underground thus allowing the sand mining, hence the name. If anyone else has a more logical explanation, I would certainly welcome it!

Anyway, back to the ride.

Lyming at Agualta Vale

The B team left out about 5am and our first stop was at Castleton to guzzle down the delicious janga soup and boiled corn which is always ready, regardless of  what time we get there.

By then we were caught up by all members of the A team, then it was off to Agualta Vale for another gathering.

We then rode east along the northcoast  highway to Annotto Bay then just out of the town, we turned south to Fort Stewart  where the hikers started their 10 k walk.

The most difficult part of the journey in my book was riding by the sea just outside of  Annotto bay, as the wind was very heavy and it was blowing in a westerly direction.

The good part is that the sea was so rough that we were washed by sea spay occasionally and to persons like myself who always welcome water, that enhanced the ride.

Rough seas indicate how breezy it was.

Apart from that, it was a fairly easy ride with good roads and good company.

When we got to Bridge 41, it seems everyone had lost the desire to swim as no one made a move, or maybe we were just too hungry to move, but then Pat saved the day with sandwiches she brought until until the food arrived from Port Maria. While we waited, Michael and Karen Chuck drove in to join us with tall Robert who was visiting from New York..

Champion rider Andrew Smellie added to the niceness by prearranging that water coconuts were picked and iced in time for our arrival.
Pity Andrew rides so infrequently!

Champion hiker Betty arrives in fine style

It is commendable to see that Lisa Williams is beginning to adopt her parents prowess for service as when the food arrived, she did not dive in like the rest of us but joined her parents in ensuring that all were fed and happy before diving in herself.

Shortly after we ate, everyone was ready to head back.

It was a great day of good healthy exercise and camaraderie and the arrangements were seamless, compliments of the Ayatollah and team.

JOAN WILLIAMS, co-host of JUSTICE on POWER 106, describes herself as an unapologetic addict to the Jamaican outdoors. A foundation member of FUN AND THRILLS ADVENTURE CLUB, she explores the island at any given opportunity cycling, hiking or swimming with that group, family, Jah 3 and anyone else who will have her. In 1995, she published the popular TOUR JAMAICA and the 4^th edition is now an ebook available at;

http://www.amazon.com/Tour-Jamaica-Joan-Williams-ebook/dp/B00EJWCSHS/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1389464644&sr=8-1&keywords=tour+jamaica+by+joan+williams

Contact; gratestj@gmail.com