Oliver Fredrick Clarke

THE GLEANER, THURSDAY, MAY 28, 2020 | www.jamaica-gleaner.com | SECTION E OCTOBER 19, 1944 - MAY 16, 2020 OLIVER FREDERICK CLARKE Media Giant • Astute Businessman Humanitarian • Father • Friend New breeze bringing political hange to Jamaica C This is an excerpted version of a speech delivered by Oliver Clarke, chairman of The Gleaner Company Ltd, to the Jamaica National Building Society (JNBS) Pensioners’ Association Luncheon in 2011. Y OU REPRESENT a very special group for me, and I thank you for inviting me to have lunch and spend some time with this exclusive group of people. JNBS is a unique organisation that has been around for a long time and during that time has given much to Jamaican people of all walks of life. Part of its uniqueness is that it is a national organisation that started in the country and its roots are not only inWestmoreland, but Montego Bay, St Ann’s Bay, Brown’s Town, Mandeville, Port Maria, Highgate, St Thomas and Kingston. We came together because so many smaller financial institutions saw the need to serve the country better and get together. JNBS is based on a spirit of people and organisations working together. So, here we are at the end of 2011. What will 2012 bring? The breeze tells me that it is possible to have a hopeful and optimistic view of the year 2012. Here are 12 reasons for optimism. After all, it will soon be 2012: 1. A new political mood ... better candidates, less violence, less rhetoric, greater focus on important issues, better-informed electorate, and realisation that the politics of the last 40 years, in which the real issues of the society have largely been overlooked, cannot continue. 2. Stronger civil society to force and monitor required change and sanction the corrupt. 3. A police force dealing with PLEASE SEE BREEZE, E12