Commentary

Prime Minister Dr Andrew Holness. - File photo.
December 9, 2025

Editorial | PM should attend COP30

It would be understandable if Prime Minister Andrew Holness wants to remain at home, to directly oversee his government’s response to the devastation caused by Hurricane Melissa a week ago. Not only…
Prime Minister Dr Andrew Holness (left) and Mark Golding, leader of the Opposition, at the 45th Annual National Leadership Prayer Breakfast.
December 9, 2025

Michael Abrahams | We need unity

Melissa, one of the strongest tropical cyclones on record, struck the island as a Category 5 hurricane, causing widespread devastation in Western Jamaica. In the island’s record-keeping history,…
Encouraging notes written by volunteers wait to be placed in feminine hygiene packages bound for Jamaica, at Food for the Poor in Coconut Creek, Florida.
December 9, 2025

Gordon Robinson | How can I help?

For once, a Tuesday column won’t include shaggy dog tales, domino metaphors or Oma D’unn’s parables. There’s nothing funny about last week’s demonic invasion by a blowhard named Melissa. Social media…
This photos shows debris from sections St. Elizabeth Technical High (STETHS) buildings damaged by Hurricane Melissa.
December 9, 2025

Editorial | A carve-out for education

Jamaica plans its recovery from the devastation caused by Hurricane Melissa, education demands a deliberate, urgent and specific carve-out. In other words, the education is so vital the country’s…
Ronald Thwaites writes: If ever there were a time for a true national front to ensure fairness, revive spirits and downplay divisions, it is now.
December 9, 2025

Ronald Thwaites | Opportunity to unite?

The pain and loss being experienced by the western half of Jamaica raises serious questions as to the calibre of national leadership and the ethical basis of public expenditure. Look how there were…
Gleaner editorial writes: But the [NaRRA] bill has serious problems. While it gets the mission broadly right, it does not yet meet the criteria public bodies in Jamaica actually need to be successful.
December 9, 2025

Lloyd Barnett | Parliamentary cabinet system versus executive presidential system

In the previous article of this series, I dealt with the merits of the Jamaicanisation of our Constitution by removing its monarchical labels and form. One result of this is that Jamaica will become…
Luis Sanchez (centre) sits with other Venezuelan migrants on a boat leaving Gardi Sugdub on Panama’s Caribbean coast.
December 9, 2025

Pía Riggirozzi | Toward COP30: climate change and forced migration in Latin America

Climate change not only destroys territories and ecosystems; it deepens historical inequalities and forces millions of people to move. In Latin America and the Caribbean, where structural poverty,…
Evlin Walsh
December 9, 2025

Evlin Walsh | The costs of cutting down trees

Trees are absolutely vital to all life on Earth. To be blunt, humans cannot survive without them: they are nature’s air purifiers, constantly cleaning our atmosphere by absorbing carbon dioxide and…
A utility pole which broke during the passage of Hurricane Melissa fell on a parked car in Salt Marsh, Trelawny.
December 9, 2025

Editorial | Melissa and the fiscal rules

The government is obviously a far way from concluding its assessment of the damage left behind by Hurricane Melissa, among the most intense storms to have developed in the Atlantic since these…