Pubdate: Thu, 13 Dec 2007
Source: Bahama Journal, The (Bahamas)
Copyright: 2007sJones Communications Ltd.
Contact: http://www.jonesbahamas.com/?c=136
Website: http://www.jonesbahamas.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/4387
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/pot.htm (Cannabis)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/coke.htm (Cocaine)

CRIME FIGHTING IN THE REGION

For a long time, Jamaica has been a trans-shipment port  for Colombian
cocaine. It is also said that a lot of  the cocaine gets smuggled out
into the islands and  sold.

In addition, drug smugglers from Haiti trade  sophisticated guns for
marijuana and cocaine, and the  island is therefore awash with guns.

The World Bank in a recent report says crime in the  Caribbean -- and
it's mostly referring to Jamaica -- is  "undermining growth,
threatening human welfare, and  impeding social development".

The Bahamas is a part of this region.

This country is also struggling with a major crime
onslaught.

For this year alone, scores of Bahamians have perished,  most of them
lost in a miasma of crime, greed and awful  despair.

Information coming in from places elsewhere in the  region -- like
Haiti and Jamaica -- tell a similarly  depressing story.

Sadly, some of our youth are perishing, biting the dust  and being
‘wasted' in a moment when so very many  of them might have been
a blessing to this or that  loved one.

Instead, these youth are being buried by their parents.

Crime has become so much a fact of life in this country  and in this
region that many Bahamians and their  Caribbean counterparts currently
take its incidence for  granted.

Like others who have commented on this issue of crime,  we are
convinced that very many Bahamians have entered  a world from which
there is no exit, save by way of  Death's cold hand.

More to the point, some Bahamians and their Caribbean  neighbours are
realistic enough to know that the  options they have include getting
rich quick or to die  trying.

In the last decade, thousands of these people have been
killed.

Compounding the matter at hand is the fact that there  are very many
people who condone crime not only in this  country, but throughout the
region.

Indeed, our research suggests that there are very many  people in
places like Jamaica and Haiti where the  trades in drugs and guns
currently feed real economic  growth, albeit at a frightfully high
price for very  many people.

Sadly, such now seems the case in The Bahamas.

What makes the Bahamian case even more frightening is  the fact that
it has a magnetic force for any number of  people in places like Haiti
and The Bahamas. That is  due to the fact that these two countries are
the  sources from which many immigrants come.

One group -- the Haitians-is easily distinguishable  due to the fact
that they speak a language -- a French  patois -- that sets them apart
from the majority of  Bahamians who speak their own unique brand and
blend of  English.

Jamaican immigrants are another matter altogether; they  speak their
own version of the Queen's English, thus  allowing them to blend in
with Bahamians in a manner  that is far easier than their Haitian brethren.

As we take note of anecdotal evidence suggesting that  there may be
trans-national criminal links between some  of these immigrants and
their Bahamian counter-parts.

Time and time again, we hear reports about this or that  plane coming
in from Haiti and the fact that onboard  there is cocaine and other
drugs to be found by  Bahamian law-enforcement authorities.

And then there are those other stories about this or  that Bahamian
thug who is living and presumably working  in Jamaica, trading in
either guns or drugs.

In and of itself, this information is not particularly
startling.

In a sense, The Bahamas is that kind of place that some  consider a
smuggler's paradise. So is the entire  region. As archipelagoes, The
Bahamas and its sister  nations in the region are being subjected to
stressors  that -- literally speaking -- come with the territory.

In a sense, this region is a place where geography is  tantamount to
destiny.

On the one hand, geography conspires to make this  region one of the
loveliest in the world, therefore  setting it up for an onslaught of
tourists from all  around the world.

That most of them happen to be from the United States,  Canada and
Britain speaks to the reality and  significance not only of geography,
but also of the  continuing salience of colonial ties and sympathies.

To this day, there remains a part of the Caribbean that  is French,
another part that is British and yet again,  parts that are Dutch and
American.

All of them are struggling with crime and the fear it
spawns.

All of them are struggling with the fact that Cuba, the  United States
and Haiti are their neighbors.

It necessarily follows that the crime problem in the  Caribbean is one
that requires a regional focus.

We believe that the United States of America should --  as a matter of
principle and justice -- play a role  commensurate with its size, role
and sway in the wider  region and throughout the world.
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MAP posted-by: Steve Heath