Dedicated ministry targeting violence impractical

Opposition Spokesman on National Security Peter Bunting, and Horace Levy, former Deputy-Chairman of the Peace Management Initiative

The Parliamentary Opposition has come out against a proposal by Prime Minister Andrew Holness for a new government ministry which focuses on violence and related issues.

Mr Holness on Sunday announced that the government is moving ahead with plans to develop the new ministry.

He said the results of a study from the commission for violence prevention, expected by the end of the year, will guide the process.

But Peter Bunting, Spokesman on National Security for the opposition People’s National Party, speaking Monday on Radio Jamaica’s Beyond the Headlines, characterised the idea of one ministry to address violence as impractical.

He said there already exists a blueprint at the Ministry of National Security Ministry, with initiatives such as Unite for Change and the Community Renewal Programme, which aim to address violence.

Horace Levy, former Deputy-Chairman of the Peace Management Initiative, who also spoke on Beyond the Headlines, said the Prime Minister, instead of creating a new ministry, should focus on implementing recommendations from previous studies that outlined ways to address the level of violence in the country.

He pointed to one particular study, carried out by Professor Herbert Gayle, on behalf of the PMI, “which many people recognise as having been the best way… to tackle the violence and the murder.”

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