The Editor, Sir:

In response to the article 'Question politicians about increased guns' (Tuesday's Gleaner , December 11), I am amazed that in view of the high murder rates and violence in Jamaica over the past few months that I have not heard either the head of the Government or the Opposition spoken out in any substantive way on the crime and violence plaguing the country.

I lived in the U.K. for nearly 40 years and if the alarming murders rates and violence that is happening in Jamaica had occurred there, Parliament would have called an emergency sitting to plan strategies to deal with it. For example, when the suicide bombers killed 52 people in London on July 7, 2005, the House of Commons responded immediately and asked for a report and the police never stopped investigating until they caught the culprits.

It was a concerted effort by the Government, police and citizens to find the suicide bombers and bring them to justice. Are Jamaicans a lesser people that it doesn't matter whether we live or die?

No response from PM

I find it absurd that neither Prime Minister Bruce Golding nor the Leader of the Opposition, Mrs. Portia Simpson Miller, has spoken seriously to the Jamaican people about crime and violence. Politicians are shot at; police officers are killed; businessmen and ordinary citizens are killed every day and no substantive responses from our leaders. It is business as usual.

It is widely believed that guns were brought to Jamaica by parties from both sides of the political fence to fight elections. Obviously, they ended up in the wrong hands - the hands of young men who see themselves as not having a future and therefore nothing worth living for. So being on drugs, in gangs and holding a gun in their hands give them power and control. But the blood of innocent men, women, children and babies is crying out to God and woe unto those who are supplying the guns and those who are pulling the trigger.

There is an internal and external vendetta against Jamaica, but we must stand strong as a nation against the 'murderous and evil spirit' that seems to have taken a strong hold in this beautiful country of ours.

I am, etc.,

H. ROWE