Power of the 'lug'

Mark Beckford, Staff Reporter

Rarely would anyone take advice from someone who dabbled in crack cocaine, a man who abused alcohol or an individual who led a life of criminality during his teenage years and was finally arrested for assault at the age of 16.

But advice is what some men whose lives have ranged from the sublime to the slime are offering Jamaican men. And they want the public to take it.

These men have participated in the Teen Challenge programme, which operates out of Ocho Rios in St Ann and they have come away from it as better men.

The initiative, which has been in operation since 1997, rehabilitates men with drug and alcohol problems. The programme teaches the men life skills as well as methods to identify their problems and set new priorities.

Teen Challenge, which is a 30-bed facility, treats men who need assistance, even if they do not have the money.

While the programme asks its participants to contribute to basic needs, it is not a mandatory request. The programme which is 12 to 18 months has a two-step phase.

There is an induction phase and a training phase. The first six months is a discipleship phase where the men are taken through courses and counselling designed to tackle the life-controlling problems they have. After the first six months, they are taught vocational skills, such as woodwork, computer skills, jewellery making and lawn care. The success rate is now 70 per cent.

Executive director of Teen Challenge, Jamaica, Anthony Richards, believes men in Jamaica are challenged and need assistance.

"I believe what has caused this is the lack of fathers in Jamaica. We have noticed that 90 per cent of the men that come into our programme grew up in a home without a father," he said.

Richards wants men to seek counselling for this, as the lack of fathers lead to many issues, which manifest in their lives.

Richards, who himself was a crack-cocaine addict, said the environment at Teen Challenge helped him to become the person he is today.

The moral-driven and supportive staff there helped him to turn his life around. He is now married and living a stable life. Not to be clichéd, he describes the work his team does at Teen Challenge as a challenge.

"Even to bring about life change, we are not the ones who change men. God is the Ultimate One who changes men, but even to bring across to the men that change is something they need in their lives. It's difficult when they just come in."

Melford Davis, who said he spent $10,000 a day on crack cocaine, admits that Jamaican men need help in today's society.

"When a man say him is a ganja smoker, him will spend $500 and get high for the day. A crack-cocaine addict needs at least $10,000 for the day to keep high, because crack cocaine only lasts in your system for three seconds."

Young men between the ages of 16 and 25 are victims and perpetrators of crime. In the educational sphere, statistics also reveal that men are lagging behind with approximately 80 per cent of those enrolled in university being women.

Davis once counted himself in the category of men who failed themselves and society. He believes Jamaican men need to attend a church to receive moral support.

He said telling a lot of men about church now, "is like you not doing anything good for them, but right now church is not like the old-time church, where you just go and sit down. You can go to church and enjoy yourself, there are a lot of activities in church now," he said.

Davis, a heavyset man with curly hair and several large rings on his fingers, told The Gleaner that during his heyday as a coke addict he devised a scheme to raise money. He would prey on female drivers by letting the air out their tyres, then charging them money to change the deflated ones. The money went towards fixing his high.

Davis' high soon turned to a low, when one day he let the air out of the wrong person's tyre.

"So I was on my bucket waiting for the person to come, so there comes a big fat man and he says to me 'yea man come over man and fix this man', so when I bend down and start to take off the lug tool and the hubcap and thing, he took the lug tool from the trunk and knocked me in the head," he said.

Davis said that experience forced him to seek a change, which he received through the help of Teen Challenge Jamaica.