By Germaine Smith, Staff Reporter 
'Passa Passa', held weekly on Spanish Town Road, in its pre-Ivan days. - File
FACING POSSIBLE looting and chaos by thugs during Hurricane Ivan last Friday, Prime Minister P.J. Patterson declared a period of public emergency. While this move may have achieved its intentions, it may have also dealt a losing hand to the world of dancehall entertainment.
With the police and army given wider powers, in the weeks to come events may well see dwindling patronage as cautious party fans avoid possible brushes with the law.
Promoters are now waiting with bated breath for the return of electricity to all areas, so that they can resume the weekly round of street dances, which dot every night of the week. Those who spoke with The Sunday Gleaner were concerned only about the electricity and not the temporarily enlarged powers of the army and police. They feel that once the country's businesses start functioning again, dancehall entertainment will fall back into place.
HARD TO IGNORE
It is hard to ignore, however, that even if patrons crave their nightly dances, they may be affected by the plethora of distractions they are being bombarded with.
For one, the country is under a period of public emergency. The period of public emergency falls under the Emergency Act. Under this act, several rights of citizens may be curtailed during the period.
Among the functions of the act are to 'make provision for the
detention of persons and the deportation and exclusion of persons from Jamaica'.
Added to this, it gives power to the security forces for 'the taking of possession or control or the managing or carrying on, as the case may be, of any property or undertaking' and for 'the acquisition of any property other than land'. Mixed with these are powers which authorise the entering and search of any premises.
Early last week, as reported in The Gleaner, the police imposed a curfew in sections of western Kingston, where at least three persons were shot and killed and several others injured following a shoot-out in downtown Kingston.
The police imposed a curfew in the following areas:
North along Charles and West streets.
South along West Queen Street and Spanish Town Road.
East along King Street.
West along West Street.
Coupled with these factors is the lack of electricity and water in several communities, which also plagued a number of businesses islandwide. It may also affect the attendance at dances.
A few weekly sessions have already been put off. Among them is the normally well-supported Wednesday night/Thursday morning McKinney's 'Passa Passa', held along Spanish Town Road in Kingston. Over the past year this session has developed a cult following which sees professionals,
foreigners and even well-known politicians mingling with the throng of regular dance goers. Organisers say a lack of electricity, plus the present security situation, have forced them to postpone the event.
NO STEPS FORWARD
"We did not have it last week because of the rains and this week we did not have any electricity. Because we did not have light we did not make any step forward," explained promoter Oneil Miles.
Miles noted that much of the tense atmosphere over Tivoli Gardens, Matthews Lane and the entire downtown district has been fuelled purely by hearsay, but patrons are tentative.
"It was just a thing fuelled by pure rumours, but people are cautious about it...
With the rumours thing people are also kind of careful. I doubt that this will affect us when we resume, though," Miles said.
"Between now and next week we will have dialogue with the police to see if we can go ahead.
"As you know, in a state of emergency a certain number of people can't be on the street together after certain hours... I don't know if they (the police) will waive it or not for our thing," he said.
Miles concluded however, that he is confident that an event on the scale of Passa Passa will resume, even if not immediately.
Further uptown there is the huge 'Hypnotiq Mondays' and the flagship street dance, 'Hot Mondays', which eventually went clubbing.
'Hot Mondays' was moved indoors to the Asylum Night Club on Knutsford Boulevard, New Kingston, after a few run-ins with the police. The club will officially be closed for refurbishing this week, but the show's promoter, Firelinks, told The Sunday Gleaner that once it reopens after Asylum's anniversary party in October, Hot Mondays will be blazing again.
HYPNOTIQ MONDAYS
Another huge session waiting at the starting gates is Hypnotiq Mondays, held along Constant Spring Road. The show's promoter, Whitfield 'Whitty' Henry, was hampered by a lack of power last week, but does not predict any dwindling in attendance due to the Emergency Act or the curfew in certain sections of the city.
"We have no light since the hurricane, so we cannot have it yet. If we get any electricity by Monday (tomorrow) we should be in full gear," he stated. Curfews or not, he is confident that the bulk of his regular patronage will return as soon as businesses get back to normal, as people actively seek entertainment again.
"The Government knows that we need to earn and I think they just want to curtail some movements, but they know that they can't just lock the city like that. Everybody will come back as soon as we start," Mr. Henry said.
Confidence seems ripe among the promoters and if the dancehall generation has anything in common with its slave roots, being in adverse conditions will not stop entertainment. Similar to them using songs to cope with their enslavement, the crowds may
eventually return to their regular sessions to divert their minds from their troubles, if only for just a few hours.
