WE HAVE already commended the senior police officers for having the courage to state publicly what has long been reported to be common place that there are deep links between the criminal underworld and politicians of varying persuasions.
We note that the Commissioner of Police, Lucius Thomas, at a press conference last Friday has gone as far as to to state that "Politics and organised crime go to bed".
This is all fine as far as statements go; but the police will now have to go one step further than make general comments which any ordinary 'Joe' on the road could make. The police have the power of their investigative authority to nab and bring to book these criminals and their political cronies.
Of particular note is that the police are deepening their investigations into the reported links of recently slain Donovan 'Bulbie' Bennett to a major housing development in a section of Spanish Town, St. Catherine.
This kind of contractual link has long provided the established route through which men of ill-repute have been baptised with legitimacy as contractors by our political representatives. Public money is farmed out to these men, who in turn not only provide jobs for the members of the clan, but they in turn can be relied on to be the violent enforcers in times of 'political war'. They provide services for the politicians who in turn reward them with contracts. That is the stuff of Jamaican politics going back several decades, notwithstanding the platitudes and comments about being committed to the rule of law.
The society as a whole has turned a blind eye to these clear acts of corruption with a shrug of the shoulder that it happens across the political divide, or that these contractors do in fact get the job done. The problem with legitimising one form of criminality is that the appetite of the beast is never satiated.
So while the public have been congratulating the police for their investigations that led them to Bennett's well-appointed haven with its spectacular view in rural Clarendon, we expect them also to flush out the political criminals with whom his type are associated. And, as we have stated in reference to other police investigations, we expect this to be the norm irrespective of political affiliation or locale.
Respect for the security forces will only be enhanced when real professionalism gets the job done in cauterising the cancer of crime.
THE OPINIONS ON THIS PAGE, EXCEPT FOR THE ABOVE, DO NOT NECESSARILY REFLECT THE VIEWS OF THE GLEANER.
