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Dennis Robotham, President of the St. Catherine Chamber of Commerce
Dennis Robotham, President of the St. Catherine Chamber of Commerce and Industry, says Chinese business operators continue to be the main target of extortionists in the parish.
Mr. Robotham, who was a guest Tuesday on the Morning Agenda on Power 106 FM, said most Chinese business owners do not report incidents of extortion because they are fearful for their lives.
He also said some business operators do not trust the police because there is a perception that there are rogue cops with connections to criminal gangs.
"So it means that the JCF (Jamaica Constabulary Force) has got to do a lot of introspection and do a lot of work to bring the confidence back to the businesses that people will feel confident to come forward," Mr. Robotham asserted.
He said there is heightened fear in the business community since last weekend's killing of 47-year-old pharmacy operator Deslan White in St. Catherine.
Mr. White's killing is believed to be linked to extortion.
According to Mr. Robotham, economic activities are negatively affected whenever a business operator is killed, since this leads to businesses being closed and workers losing their jobs.
"The customer service is hampered there, they have to find somewhere else that is probably out of the area, that sort of thing. There are so many areas that [are] impacted when something like this happens," he lamented.
Mr. Robotham urged the government to find alternatives to a State of Public Emergency in the quest to reduce crime.
He called for a comprehensive crime plan, asserting that the state of emergency is no longer effective in fighting crime in St. Catherine.
"New York, other places that have had problems with bigger societies and numbers in terms of population, seem to be able to have curbed their problems. We can't look for best practices and try to tolerate or get some help somewhere to deal with this sort of thing? It's becoming almost like a hopelessness that is overhanging in the business community," he said, suggesting this hopelessness has led some business operators to reconsider their investment in the parish.
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