New note shows someone's not paying attention

Once again, Facebook (or friends on FB) broke the news for me that the Bank of Jamaica is issuing a new note. Forget the Nanny folks, our highest bill is now $10,000 (about USD$113 in today's dollars). I figured without a doubt that Bob Marley would grace this bill. Instead, I saw former Prime Minister Shearer.

At first I passed it off to government shortsightedness. "Long time dem a fight out di dread" and such thoughts. But then today I read a Jamaica Observer story titled "It can't be Bob" that explained the law governing whose image can appear on Jamaican currency.

But according to Tony Morrison, head of the BOJ's public relations department, the criteria for selection was made soon after the country gave up using the British pound and started printing its own money in 1969.

"Only the images of national heroes and dead prime ministers go on our money. The criteria came about soon after we started using our own money," Morrison told the Observer.

To me, this simply says that we're suffering from shortsightedness of another kind. Not baldhead vs. dread, but an apparent willingness to take a second look at laws made perhaps during the first blush of emancipation. No, I'm not saying that we should have a wholesale repeal of our Constitution or all laws, but the 1969 committee addressed whether we should have our own currency and replacing the image of the queen with our national heroes. The 21st century is a different time and place (mind you, we still have the mace in Parliament as a representation of the crown, but that's for another blog on another day).

Even if the government or BOJ didn't want to tackle the law on the books, perhaps we should instead look at expanding our list of national heroes to include not only Bob, but Miss Lou.

While perhaps not on Marley's scale, Louise Bennet-Coverly is without a doubt an icon of Jamaica, known by voice or sight by anyone from the rock. She's left a long-lasting legacy that you can see to this day at May Day celebrations and at Emancipation and Independence time. (My favorite poem is Colonization in Reverse.) As far as I'm concerned is Miss Lou why nuff people feel OK speaking patois to the point where Jamaican newspapers now leave people's quotes in the vernacular instead of dressing it up as the Queen's English. Just Google Miss Lou and she's the first hit — that's an icon by 21st century standards if you ask me.

Forget the tourism impact of making Bob Marley a national hero and placing him on a bill... We missed an almost golden opportunity for change and the Lord knows we could use something for Jamaicans to rally around to build something better for our island. Since I've lived to see the loss of the $1, $2, $5, $10 and $20 bills and the addition of the $500 and $1,000 notes and I haven't been on God's earth 3 decades, I have no doubt that I'll be here when we roll out a $10,000. I just hope that the driver isn't asleep in the wheel when we pull up to that bus stop.