Kingston, Jamaica, May 23, (PRINTWORDS NEWS) Gangsters, while on the one hand, being some of the most powerful men in the country, are also some of the most abhorred. However, it continues to baffle people when these very vermin of the society manage to garner a huge amount of support. However, one close look at the lives of these gangsters is sure to do away with all doubts regarding their popularity. For they are not only the ones that the police hunt to death. They are often just what Mario Puzo had described in his celebrated book, Godfathers to the common people.
That this was not merely a figment of imagination of the author and that it is, in fact, the hard truth has been exemplified in the case of the Jamaican state of emergency that has been imposed on Kingston, the state capital. The state of emergency was declared by he government after a group, who has been recognized by the police as supporters of the alleged Mafia don of the region, Christopher Dudus Coke.
Apparently, the supporters of the so-called drug lord had gone on to launch attacks on police stations. Moreover, large numbers of those same supporters had swathed certain parts of the city, naturally causing huge disruption in the day to day activities of the citizens. According to reports, these mobsters had attacked the police stations in the city with Molotov cocktails. Two of the stations had to be evacuated following a brief struggle, but the state of the third station remains enveloped in smoke, literally, till now. One of the stations was also set on fore; however, nobody was inside as it had been evacuated shortly before.
The supporters had also ventured to barricade some parts of the city, mainly west Kingston, where they resorted to the use of sandbags, barbed wire, and even vehicles, and, in fact, anything under the sun. The encounters that ensued between the mob and the police forces resulted in two people being injured: a policeman and a civilian. However, some reports suggest that another policeman had also been injured.
The streets of the West Kingston region was seen infested with gunmen, armed with high end weapons. The region resembled an impromptu fortress, with the crooks taking over the region completely.
Apparently, the mob took to the streets once it was reported that the police were searching for Christopher Dudus Coke. Apparently, the police have been looking for the man for a pretty long time, who they believe is a drug dealer. However, the man is held in high esteem among the common people of the West Kingston area, a region notorious as the heartland of crime and possibly the grittiest of all the low income slum regions in the whole of Jamaica. In this region, Christopher Dudus Coke is hailed as somewhat of a Godfather, and the people, enraged at the suggestion that he is wanted by the lawmakers, openly declared that he has done more for them than the government of the country.
It has been reported that the police had asked Christopher Dudus Coke to surrender on Sunday, shortly before the gunmen took to the streets, in order to hand him over to the government. The Prime Minister, Bruce Golding, had decided that the alleged gangster would be extradited after a trial.
However, the police department insisted that the fights had been totally unprovoked. in order to ensure that no further damages or loss of life occurs, the civilian residents of the regions were asked to evacuate immediately after the rebellion erupted. Travel alerts were sent out in Jamaica, warning tourists to avoid the region due to civil unrest. The state of emergency is going to continue in the country for an indefinite period.
It cannot b denied that the situation brings home the sad plight of the government of the country. Not only have they failed to capture a known gangster for long, they have also lost to him the position of authority over the civilians, who treat the gangster as more of law than the government of the country.
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