Polack Post: Caribbean – Spending Not Standing

By Peter Polack Peter Polack The rookie premier of one of the smallest and richest British possessions in the Caribbean recently declared that they are standing with Jamaica in the Melissa storm disaster. The Jamaicans have stoically borne the worst part in a day of turmoil and the last thing they need are platitudes from one of it’s nearest neighbors. Nor does it need the temporary use of helicopter and plane landing spaces. Jamaica urgently needs help in the form of funding and available resources from governments near and far. They have recently sent precious law enforcement resources to Haiti at great risk. They are a team player. This is an opportunity for the entire CARICOM membership and associates to display not only unity from the podium but that they are lions not mice. Sometime ago the declining British influence in the Caribbean was marked by a profusion of new republics and the declining influence of the Commonwealth. This was unaffected by recent Royalty visits trying to prop up a losing wicket. The people of Portland in Jamaica are still waiting for a promised $60 million tourist railway in 2016 to be financed by the UK Caribbean Infrastructure Fund, much less the $300 million to eight fake lucky Commonwealth countries. In 2017 the UK government was to set up a private sector Task Force to help long-term reconstruction in countries and territories hit by Caribbean hurricanes under the banner, UK leads the way to build back better after Hurricanes. Now is the time for the United Kingdom to truly put up or shut up. Help the Caribbean or leave the Caribbean, including their colonies. Not far behind is France, recently expelled from Africa, and in dire need not to repeat the same mistake. Thanks for the Alliance Francaise but we need 25,000 houses immediately, to the Marseillaise soundtrack. Then there is the vacillating European Union.The EU has made a number of large contributions to Jamaica’s development as a civil society, one of the most recent being a token grant of 30 million euros for digital transformation, climate change, human rights and citizen security to fulfill their agenda. The European Union needs to step up the plate. It is as bad in Jamaica as the Ukraine and the EU needs to fill the hole left by American non interest in the Caribbean but for targeted maritime assassinations. 25,000 Jamaicans are homeless. The time to help is when people are in need of assistance. They have 24,999 people standing beside each and every one of them. The airwaves are full of people standing but empty of those sending actual help. Act now or be silent in the future. Peter Polack is a former criminal lawyer from the Cayman Islands for several decades. His books are The Last Hot Battle of the Cold War: South Africa vs. Cuba in the Angolan Civil War (2013), Jamaica, The Land of Film (2017) and Guerrilla Warfare: Kings of Revolution (2019). He was a contributor to Encyclopedia of Warfare (2013). His latest book is a compendium of Russian espionage activities with almost five hundred Soviet spies expelled from nearly 100 countries worldwide 1940-88. His views are his own.

By Peter Polack

Peter Polack

The rookie premier of one of the smallest and richest British possessions in the Caribbean recently declared that they are standing with Jamaica in the Melissa storm disaster. The Jamaicans have stoically borne the worst part in a day of turmoil and the last thing they need are platitudes from one of it’s nearest neighbors. Nor does it need the temporary use of helicopter and plane landing spaces.

Jamaica urgently needs help in the form of funding and available resources from governments near and far. They have recently sent precious law enforcement resources to Haiti at great risk. They are a team player.

This is an opportunity for the entire CARICOM membership and associates to display not only unity from the podium but that they are lions not mice.

Sometime ago the declining British influence in the Caribbean was marked by a profusion of new republics and the declining influence of the Commonwealth. This was unaffected by recent Royalty visits trying to prop up a losing wicket.

The people of Portland in Jamaica are still waiting for a promised $60 million tourist railway in 2016 to be financed by the UK Caribbean Infrastructure Fund, much less the $300 million to eight fake lucky Commonwealth countries.

In 2017 the UK government was to set up a private sector Task Force to help long-term reconstruction in countries and territories hit by Caribbean hurricanes under the banner, UK leads the way to build back better after Hurricanes.

Now is the time for the United Kingdom to truly put up or shut up. Help the Caribbean or leave the Caribbean, including their colonies.

Not far behind is France, recently expelled from Africa, and in dire need not to repeat the same mistake. Thanks for the Alliance Francaise but we need 25,000 houses immediately, to the Marseillaise soundtrack.

Then there is the vacillating European Union.The EU has made a number of large contributions to Jamaica’s development as a civil society, one of the most recent being a token grant of 30 million euros for digital transformation, climate change, human rights and citizen security to fulfill their agenda.

The European Union needs to step up the plate. It is as bad in Jamaica as the Ukraine and the EU needs to fill the hole left by American non interest in the Caribbean but for targeted maritime assassinations.

25,000 Jamaicans are homeless.

The time to help is when people are in need of assistance. They have 24,999 people standing beside each and every one of them.

The airwaves are full of people standing but empty of those sending actual help.

Act now or be silent in the future.

Peter Polack is a former criminal lawyer from the Cayman Islands for several decades. His books are The Last Hot Battle of the Cold War: South Africa vs. Cuba in the Angolan Civil War (2013), Jamaica, The Land of Film (2017) and Guerrilla Warfare: Kings of Revolution (2019). He was a contributor to Encyclopedia of Warfare (2013). His latest book is a compendium of Russian espionage activities with almost five hundred Soviet spies expelled from nearly 100 countries worldwide 1940-88.

His views are his own.