The EDITOR, Sir:

ORETT BRUCE Golding has the most unenviable job, that of being prime minister of Jamaica. He has found himself the head of a nation and of a people who are an enigma - a people who are the friendliest on earth yet at the same time one of the most violent in the world. He is also the ruler of a nation likened to that described in Leviticus 26 verse 14 - 46.

It is a people who are bogged down in unimaginable vice and criminality, and who have no serious desire to be dug out of this untenable situation. Starting at the very top of Jamaican society, clothed in smiles and affability, it seeps to the very bottom, spread out and sucks in all in its web.

Controversy

The Jamaican national character (attitude) is a by-product of this situation. Julian "Jungles" Reynolds in his article of July 27, alluded to this: "This depraved 'kass-kass' attitude pervades the entire society. It is in Parliament, banks, business places, clubs, middle class homes, tenement yards, dancehall music, schools and even the Church. Much time spent arguing and less time spent producing.' "

Bruce Golding's pronounce-ments which at times have stirred controversy, could they be 'The Song of the Caged Bird?' - songs not of joy but of pain. Is it that a prime minister is trying to understand, to comprehend, to decipher the soul and heart of his own people?

Could his pronouncements which at times have angered some, be a call to examine our role in the cosmos and not a war cry to start 'kass-kass'?

I am, etc.,

P. LOGAN

Duncans PO

Trelawny