Compensate people by land reparation

PRIME MINISTER Andrew Holness’ references to “unplanned communities” (The Gleaner, November 11, 2020) has its genesis in other historical events that supersede the facilitation of such informal communities by ‘political expediency’of the political parties.

It is rooted in the unjust actions of the Jamaica Assembly at Emancipation and which has been upheld by successive governments of Jamaica since political Independence, that is, denial of access to a good land.

According to historian Richard Hart, the ex-slaves were not only refused financial compensation, but were denied access to a good land, forcing them to move to the hillsides and gully banks. Entrance to these communities was often via abandoned river courses; now with climate change, these roadways are the natural routes for excessive water run-off.

In further acts to prevent the emancipated blacks from having significant influence at the 1840 polls, hundreds more were disfranchised from voting, when their lands were confiscated due to lack of ‘proof of ownership’, and returned to the authorities as Crown lands. Hence, they too were unable to meet the landownership criteria for voting, and forced to live in unplanned communities.

This injustice was never addressed at Independence, nor by any of the nation’s political parties.

The government is the largest landowner (of Crown lands) in Jamaica and the time has come to compensate the people. The government and the opposition must cooperate in fast-tracking land reform, especially by the reparation of land to those families who were wronged in the 1840s (I am sure the British have the records of those whose lands were taken away), and have those lands reassigned to the descendants of the former slaves at the time of Emancipation. This, indeed, would be the first act of true reparation for the Jamaican people. DUDLEY C. MCLEAN II Mandeville, Manchester dm15094@gmail.com