Commentary

Workmen labour to clear debris from drains along the Race Course main road in St Mary on Monday.
December 9, 2025

Elizabeth Morgan | Jamaica and natural disasters – preparation should be high priority

AT THE time of writing, we are still waiting for Hurricane Melissa, now category 5, which could be the most powerful hurricane ever experienced in Jamaica since records have been kept. As many of us…
Gabriel Cabrera, president of the Venezuelan Youth Center for Democracy, gives a statement outside of the US embassy with members of the organisation holding signs against US intervention, in reference to US warships operating in the Caribbean, in Caracas,
December 9, 2025

Norris R. McDonald | Venezuela, Exxon, and God King Trump’s militarisation of greed!

Exxon’s 2026 plunge into Jamaica’s Walton Morant Basin isn’t just about oil — it is imperialism snapping at Caribbean sovereignty. Early estimates suggest that a potential yield of 406 million barrels…
December 9, 2025

Sabrina Barnes | Period poverty exists and language matters

IN RECENT conversations around access to menstrual products and healthcare, a provocative claim has surfaced: “Oh, period poverty doesn’t exist. People can buy things. Poor people boasty. Call it…
Children look at students attending school at a shelter for families displaced by gang violence in Port-au-Prince, Haiti.
December 9, 2025

Editorial | Is Haiti ready?

As midwife to Haiti’s transitional arrangement, the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) should signal its position on whether the country can hold credible elections in four months time and what may be…
Bellevue Hospital, Windward Road, Kingston.
December 9, 2025

Gordon Robinson | A rose by any other name…

The Dunce’s behaviour at the domino table was always erratic as he marched to the beat of a different drummer. “March” might be a strong word since he always proudly answered queries as to his…
December 9, 2025

Editorial | Use finance and industrial policy to power Jamaica’s growth

Recently, both Standard & Poor’s (S&P) and the Bank of Jamaica (BOJ) have sounded a quiet alarm. Despite macroeconomic stability and strong capital buffers, credit growth has slowed – from…
This combination photo shows former prime ministers of Jamaica P.J. Patterson (left) and Bruce Golding.
December 9, 2025

Editorial | Former leaders right

Their intervention is unlikely to alter Donald Trump’s increasingly militaristic posture in the area. However, last week’s insistence by 10 former CARICOM leaders that the Caribbean be respected as a…
Christopher Burgess
December 9, 2025

Christopher Burgess | Why Melissa matters: Balancing debt with development

People in Jamaica have been preparing and bracing for Hurricane Melissa’s impact since last Monday. Trust stare us in the face; underdevelopment remains our national vulnerability.
Ronald Thwaites writes: It is unforgivable that parliament has failed to initiate this consideration over the four years since the Patterson Report has been available.
December 9, 2025

Ronald Thwaites | Basic competencies

I hold strongly that if all of our people had a firm grounding in religious or humanistic virtues and could read and write in both our languages and compute serviceably, the nation would thrive both…