Robert Buddan, Contributor

On Tuesday, June 12, the Minister of National Security, Peter Phillips, tabled Jamaica's National Security Policy (NSP), and the next day he made his sectoral presentation elaborating on achievements and plans ahead. Jamaica's murder rate for 2006 and 2007 remains below that of 2005. Operation Kingfish, established in late 2004, has brought in 340 gang members, leaders and masterminds, significantly reduced Jamaica's role as a transit for cocaine, and some six suspected drug kingpins have been extradited, or are awaiting extradition to the United States.

The Government tabled a National Security Strategy Green Paper in January 2006 towards creating the National Security Policy with an implementation unit to coordinate the security strategy across government departments. This confirms a new trend in governance. Increasingly, common themes are being mainstreamed in policies across the board through different ministries. Some of these include science and technology, values and attitudes, community development, and now, national security.

National security itself is to be governed in a new way. It is to draw on science and technology, community volunteerism, modern policing, and values and attitudes. The coordination will come through a National Security Council chaired by the Prime Minister. The NSP recognises that the means and opportunities for crime have changed, and indeed, have increased. For this reason, the Government of Jamaica has offered new analysis and solutions. The minister sums this up as follows:The threat posed by crime can only be understood within the context of a new world order where globalisation, science and technology are creating daily vast and new opportunities which criminals also exploit.

Greater opportunities

Transparent national borders, fewer trade restrictions, and modernised financial and telecommunications systems provide greater opportunities for criminal organisations to expand their operations beyond national boundaries. Jamaica, like the rest of the Caribbean, is particularly vulnerable to transnational criminal intrusion because of our geography, size, and a general inability to keep pace with technological advances.

Consequently, the NSP has broader objectives than traditional crime-fighting strategies have had. The NSP has eight objectives: (1) Dismantle organised criminal networks (2) Strengthen criminal justice systems (3) Protect Jamaica from terrorism (4) Protect and control Jamaica's territory (5) Strengthen the integrity of democratic institutions (6) Increase Jamaica's contribution to regional and international security (7) Provide the environment for a stable economy and delivery of social services, and (8) Protect natural resources and reduce the risk of natural disasters.

At their meeting with President Bush on June 20, CARICOM Prime Ministers raised many of these issues. Three aspects of the minister's analysis need to be noted. One is that Jamaica has been a very open society with movement in and out that unintentionally facilitates networking between major drug consuming and drug and gun producing organisations.

Second, as Jamaica's own telecommunications networks become more sophisticated, so do those of criminals. Jamaica is the most densely penetrated middle-income country for cellular phones. Third, as Jamaica's liberalisation intensifies, there is more opportunity for guns and drugs to move through the ports. Globalisation, in these ways, creates new challenges for crime fighting.

Historians point out, and the recent World Bank/UN study on crime in the Caribbean confirmed that Jamaica was always open to major smuggling activities because of its location and openness, and at one time did a thriving business in illegal smuggling in goods and slaves. But the problem need not overwhelm us. The Report of the United States Department of State on Trafficking in Persons upgraded Jamaica's ranking because it has acknowledged the problem, passed strong legislation, educated the public, worked with other countries and Jamaicans responded.

Deportations

The Prime Minister has also taken the issue of Jamaica's vulnerability as a small state to the United States. Speaking at the Conference on the Caribbean in Washington on June 19, she pointed out that Jamaica and Caribbean states are determined by the United Nations tobe among the most vulnerable in the world to global effects of trade, natural disasters, health epidemics, and crime. She identified exposure to the impact of deportations as an example. Minister Phillips had put this in perspective in his sectoral presentation.

The scale of deportation activity in and of itself is cause for concern. alone almost 2,000 criminal offenders were deported to Jamaica. In effect, deportation practically doubles the number of criminal offenders who are released on to our streets every year. I have already described the global context in which the criminal networks operate. Simply moving a person from one jurisdiction to another does not solve the problem of their involvement in criminal activities or their involvement in trans-national crime. Those who re-offend remain just as mobile and just as dangerous, and the deporting countries remain as at-risk as we the receiving countries.

The minister made a valid point. It makes no sense to transfer dangerous persons from more secure to less secure environments. The deporting countries remain at risk, and this puts more pressure on border management. As the minister said:

The current security environment dictates that global security is only as strong as the weakest link anywhere. While we cannot be police to the world, our responsibility is to ensure that our border management systems are as secure as possible. This includes the effectiveness of immigration controls for entry and exit, the effectiveness and efficiency of our procedures for granting residency and citizenship and enhancing the integrity of our passport as an important symbol of our national identity.

New policing

The government believes that it is time to comprehensively overhaul the 140 year-old police establishment through four major reforms: (1) intelligence (2) correctional services, (3) criminal justice system, and (4) community policing.

Minister Phillips believes that enough effort has not been made to modernise the Jamaican police force to bring it into the 21st century. Therefore, in the NSP:

Our vision of a modern police force is one where officers are highly trained and motivated, possess the highest levels of integrity, and display professionalism and due regard for the rights of every Jamaican citizen. These officers will work in an environment that is supported by the use of appropriate technological tools, forensic sciences, highly effective intelligence gathering and analysis, and the most sophisticated hardware available to repel the threat to law and order.

For example, there will be a new assistant commissioner with responsibility for anti-corruption management in the police force, along with professionalism and internal accountability to citizens' complaints (bodies that have already been established) to improve the image of the force.

Just as Jamaicans responded to the efforts to curb human trafficking they can respond to the idea of Community Safety Officers, announced to be part of the National Security Policy. The minister is to set up a system of Community Safety Officers, community volunteers who will both act as a bridge between the community and the police and a buffer between the community and crime.

Every community should make sure its core of CSOs is established and gets the necessary training to do community audits, check for breaches of environmental, public order, and public transport laws, help to collect information on crimes committed in the community, and even patrol alongside the Jamaica Constabulary Force.

Robert Buddan lectures in the Department of Government, Mona, UWI. Email: robert.buddan@uwimona.edu.jm