Organisers proud of ‘excellent’ diaspora protest turnout in Florida

Expats looking forward to additional demonstrations in US over Jamaica’s chronic crime, corruption

FOLLOWING WHAT he described as a successful protest outside the Jamaican consulate-general’s office in Miami, Florida, United States (US), yesterday, Dr Rupert Francis, chairman of the Jamaica Diaspora Crime Intervention & Prevention Task Force, said he was expecting similar outcomes for the seven other planned demonstrations across the diaspora.

According to Francis, about 70 placard-bearing people showed up at the venue for the protest which took the form of a rally. It saw addresses from speakers such as Wilfered Rattigan, a former Federal Bureau of Investigation special agent and attorney, and blogger Carlos ‘Jamaican Carlos’ Grey.

Additionally, he said more than 3,000 others tuned in online.

“We thought it was excellent in terms of what we are trying to achieve,” he said. “People took the train, one person came from Chicago, other people came from up St Lucie, Orlando, North Carolina and one other person tried to find the place for two hours, and they still came.”

Francis, a retired captain in the Jamaica Defence Force, told The Gleaner that the protests are to bring attention to the Government’s stewardship of Jamaica, highlighting its failure to gain control over the country’s crime rate and corruption. Additionally, Francis said he would be asking donors to review where their money is being spent.

Notice of the plans for countrywide protests at offices managed by the Jamaican Government in the US was given to Ambassador Audrey Marks, Jamaica’s most senior diplomat in the US, last December.

Other protests are being planned for Washington DC, New York, Canada and the United Kingdom.

Describing himself as merely an “advocate for equal rights and justice”, Francis again dismissed critics, including the Global Jamaica Diaspora Council (GJDC) and its youth arm, who have accused him of trying to embarrass the Holness-led administration, and others who have labelled his protests as politically motivated.

“The whole idea that we are trying to destroy Jamaica has to be debunked because that has not been the case. In fact, there is some people that came. I’m talking about elderly Jamaicans that came out … and they only came because they love Jamaica and they represented different organisations and parties. So it was not a political thing as they made it out to be, it was simply an expression of solidarity with the other Jamaicans that believe in better for Jamaica, for all Jamaicans,” he stated.

SOCIAL PROGRAMMES

Francis said that, eight years ago, the task force sought to implement social programmes in Jamaica to tackle the country’s crime rate. However, he said the Government’s lacklustre assent resulted in their abatement.

“We proposed that we would use what is called a Safer City Initiative which is to get involved in the cities like they did in Los Angeles and so on and work with the people. We have done that, we have done experiments in Jamaica but it appears as if this Government does not want to listen to it. That’s half of the problem,” he said.

Alando Terrelonge, state minister in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade, in a previous response, while arguing that members of the GJDC were shocked by and in disagreement with the letter to Marks, highlighted that Diaspora members have had an “unprecedented” level of engagement with the Government over the last five years.

But Francis argued that, despite the pushback the protests have been receiving, there is a lot of support for them in Jamaica.

“I get calls from Jamaica from people in various organisations who are supporting me wholeheartedly,” he said. “There are Jamaicans everywhere who are giving their support and thanking me for standing up... . We have to make them understand that it is Jamaica first, second and third.”

Approximately 1.1 million Jamaicans are domiciled overseas, according to the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs’ Population Division (2020), with women accounting for 57.5 per cent of that figure.