The Wailers 1973 London

Paris Theatre
London
1973.05.24

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Edited rebroadcast.
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The Commonwealth realms, shown in blue. Former Commonwealth realms are red.

During a referendum of September 19, 1961 the Jamaican people voted decisively to seek independence from Great Britain and ultimately this was achieved on August 6, 1962. What the common people didn't know was that the island's sovereignty was still retained by Great Britain. Independent ?

 Bauxite and close proximity to the USA are the problems. A US-backed campaign of economic destabilsation , together with the govermment’s own fiscal mismanagement, brought the economy to the brink of collapse; and drove the country and its government into the clutches of the IMF.

 Since then a series of IMF and World Bank adjustment programmes have brought widespread privatisation, deregulation, liberalisation, financialisation and deprivation. Jamaica now enjoys a status of virtual trusteeship exercised by the international financial institutions; its economy reliant on remittances from the labour of the Jamaican diaspora, tourism, and international drug trafficking; while its resources are drained by debt paymemts, brain drain, a parasitic local elite (just 13 families own the whole island) and an insatiable appetite for imports.

 The emergence of whole depressed communities beholden to criminal organisations with ties to both political parties on the one hand, and externally-supported securitisation of the state on the other hand , have further compromised the ability of the state to act autonomously in both the internal and the external spheres.

 Some of the youngsters are saying perhaps things would be better under British rule, much to the alarm of elders who suffered English racist neo-nazi occupation. The constant rioting in Britain is evidence, if any is really needed, of England's ingrained racism and intolerance.