Dear Prime Minister,
When you entered politics on the coattail of former Prime Minister Edward Seaga, we saw you as a young man, from humble beginnings, impressionable, but rightly armed with Christian learning and packing great promise.
When it became clear that you had a desire to become the chief servant of the people, we thought it was a great thing for a young man to pursue. We hoped that in that role, you would lead righteously, honouring God in all things and counting others more significant than yourself and your well-positioned friends.
When you were eventually appointed chief servant, we trusted that you would be above reproach, sober-minded, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, not a drunkard, not violent but gentle, not quarrelsome, and certainly not a lover of money.
You were ushered into the highest office of the nation’s executive on two separate occasions. Despite the impression of breastmilk still lining your top lip, we figured that from your learned and mature pronouncements, you understood the assignment and were committed to the mission and mores of a proud and resilient people who have overcome some of the hardest seasons of human existence.
Yes, you made a number of missteps and political blunders in your early career, but we gave you the benefit of the doubt and encouraged your aspirations.
We will never forget how you stood at the podium in your first inauguration speech, declaring that Jamaica’s potential for prosperity had not yet been realised because of a lack of fiscal discipline. You said it was the greatest injustice perpetrated on Jamaicans by successive governments over the years.
We heard you commit to doing better, and we really thought you would. It was our hope that you would diligently manage the nation’s money as well as that of your own ever-growing household.
We took careful note, Mr. Prime Minister, when your government selfishly awarded parliamentarians massive salary increases, while teachers, security workers, public servants, and others were given peanut-sized raises on their less-than-liveable wages, despite fighting for better.
We saw hundreds of our teachers migrating to greener pastures, seeking better for themselves and their families, leaving our classrooms empty. Many lost hope in our country, our government, and you.
It was shocking to us when your government evicted some of the poorest of our people from government-owned lands they had long occupied. Their tears and desperate pleas were heartbreaking, and we wondered if your government had gone deaf and blind to the plight of our most vulnerable. This was happening even while wealthy and well-positioned men and women funded major and unregulated developments in various upscale communities.
Be careful, Mr. Prime Minister, that the cry of the poor does not reach the ears of their God. We all know that he who shuts his ear to the poor man’s cry shall himself plead and not be heard. Remember, you swore to be chief servant of the same people, not to be domineering.
Today, the majority of opinion polls indicate that you have ruled over the highest perception of corruption this nation has ever seen. Whatever good you may have done, Mr. Prime Minister, it seems to be lost under the weight of the hardships the people are enduring under your stewardship.
Mr. Prime Minister, we cringe every time mention is made that your financial submissions to the Integrity Commission in recent years have yet to be approved. This is not only an embarrassment for us as a people; it is a national disgrace, which suggests that we have fallen beneath the mark on the integrity yardstick. We pray that this is not so.
Today, we see you as a shadow of your youthful zeal. Yes, you have grown older, but we are not sure that you are wiser for it. You display a deficit in wisdom in too many instances. Your decision to willingly embrace and boldly wear the tag of ‘Brogad,’ a name coined by criminals, amid worrying murder trends and brutality eroding the very fabric of the nation you swore to serve, was ill-advised.
It breaks our hearts to see your government signing away our rights to others under one of the most egregiously ungodly treaties of modern times. This Samoa agreement goes against what we believe about ourselves, our families, our human and reproductive rights, and what our children should be taught about their gender.
We are even more disappointed to learn that your government signed away our rights because you needed money for budgetary support and to fund climate change responses.
As you were taught in Sabbath school, Mr. Prime Minister, which you would have attended as a declared member of the Seventh-day Adventist Church, our Eternal Father who created the universe, the earth, and all that is in it still controls the winds, the rains, and every element of the created order.
He placed you in the position of leadership to shepherd and exercise oversight over His people, not to be domineering over those in your charge.
Opinion polls show that the majority of Jamaicans have lost faith in you and see you as leading a nation that is fast heading in the wrong direction.
It is a great worry to the people of this nation how our Prime Minister can sit silently and allow the role of the Church of the True and Living God to be diminished and that prayer and devotions in our schools are threatened.
We heard you, Mr. Prime Minister, when you suggested that we should consider hate speech laws, and this signalled to us that the Word of God, declared by us, is not meeting the approval of those in high places locally or internationally.
We heard you, Mr. Prime Minister, when you indicated that Jamaica will advance quickly to becoming a fully digital society, and we wondered what kind of consideration would be given to the elderly and unbanked members of our communities who are only able to engage the economy through cash solutions.
Mr. Prime Minister, our hospitals are often without adequate bed space, critical medicines, and other technical services. The majority of our people have no option but to rely on the pop-down responses to their health needs. Pay careful attention, Mr. Prime Minister. God will avenge the oppressors of the poor, the widow, and the orphans above whom the Holy Spirit has made you overseer.
Mr. Prime Minister, the woes of the people are many. Their prayers have risen to the ears of their Lord and Saviour. Through the voices of God’s appointed prophets, He has made it known that Jamaica must declare three consecutive days of repentance, fasting, prayer, and mourning. This, your government has curiously ignored, even as the country continues to shake and tremble with recurring earthquakes and tremors.
These are signals from our Eternal Father, Mr. Prime Minister, that He is not pleased with our land and the unrighteous path we have taken.
Mr. Prime Minister, perhaps nobody told you, but righteousness exalts a nation, and sin is a reproach to any people. Jamaica is on the road to reproach, Mr. Prime Minister. And it is happening under your watch.