BASSETERRE, St. Kitts – FOUR inmates of Her Majesty’s Prison (HMP) were highly commended for their knowledge, eloquence and diction displayed at a debate competition last week Monday (Sept. 3) at the correctional institution.
The four inmates were Ramie Gumbs, Wycliffe Liburd, Ricky Ferlance and Vincent Fahie.
“Was Kim Collins treated fairly?” was the moot for the debate and Fahie and Ferlance were the Proponents, with the former being the leader, and Liburd and Gumbs were the Opponents, with the latter leading the team.
There were three adjudicators and among them was former Commonwealth Youth Ambassador Jeneve Mills, who noted that despite limited access to information, the debaters had enough facts to support their arguments.
He however indicated that popular Mathematics teacher now serving time at the institution, Newrish Nital, was of tremendous help to the four men in their preparation for the event, as well as some Prison Officers whom they engaged in discussions and had provided them with newspapers. Also, they had some degree of freedom to television broadcasting the conflict between Collins and members of the National Olympic Committee and the St. Kitts-Nevis Amateur Athletics Association.
Mills had singled out Liburd as the Best Debater and noted that he, Gumbs and Ferlance had used many analogies in their presentation.
The debate was a very powerful one. The Opponents had won but not without a fierce battle of words, facts and assumptions from the Proponents.
“The debate was powerful. I want to quote Wycliffe who had used a lot of analogies in his presentation. He started out by saying that ‘Hell is full with a lot of good intentions’, and this is somebody who is serving a life sentence. And for a man in his position to say that, to me it is like looking beyond the scope of a prisoner. This analogy strongly suggests that he may now be seeing life from a different perspective…a totally different perspective.
Mills explained that Fahie’s opening statement was that “principles and discipline should always be the order of the day”, and that “if Kim Collins could get away with breaking the rules and regulations that means that I can also get away too. But how come you have me in jail"?
Mills said: “The Opponents won the debate and the reason for them winning is because the Proponents argued that Kim Collins was treated fairly and the management team’s decision was justified due to him breaking some sort of rules and or regulations. However, the fact was brought out that no rules or regulations, to this day, have been made public by the NOC, which means, arguably, ‘What rule did Kim Collins break?’
“Additionally, the Opponents raised a very valid point, in that the principle is that if the athletes should all be in the Olympic Village, then the managers would have broken principle by allowing Kim Collins to go with his wife for the initial 24 hours grace period given to him. Therefore, principle would have already been broken.”
He said that in an attempt to aptly illustrate his point, Liburd postulated that “nobody is saying to break the law, but bend it”.
“I also came to realise that the debaters were not just arguing a point that Collins was treated unfairly because of who he is, but because he is a man…he is just and everybody is prone to mistakes. They went on to say, ‘Yes he erred by what he did, but the persons dealing with the punishment process could have probably dealt with it from a different angle’”.
Noting what transpired during the Opponents’ rebuttal, Mills quoted Gumbs: “Dictionary does not dictate events, but circumstances do.”
“Ramie Gumbs said those words in his rebuttal to what was said by the Proponents that Kim Collins was treated fairly. He was making the point that they came with the dictionary standpoint in what fairly and rights mean.
“Ramie Gumbs also said, ‘Kim was pregnant with the wealth of the nation.’ And such analogies make one thinks, because Kim was indeed pregnant with the wealth of the nation and he still is. To substantiate his reason for saying that, Ramie Gumbs reminded that many people had never heard about St. Kitts and Nevis, but through Kim Collins exploits on the track the two tiny dots on the world map grew extensively,” explained Mills.
He also noted that the Proponents had much valuable information about “Mr. Alphonso Bridgewater in terms of him being instrumental nationally for the cricket and football teams and being very critical in making certain that we have a National Olympics Committee in St. Kitts and Nevis.
“The fact that these people had this information just makes you wonder why society has just turned a blind eye to them. So, there is a lot of work to be done, there are a lot of things that we can do…people on the outside can go in and make a contribution towards the enhancement of the inmates’ rehabilitation programme”.
The former Commonwealth Youth Ambassador is of the view that a lot of work is being done in the prison and that the inmates are not idly sitting back doing nothing.
“They are attending English, Mathematics and a number of other classes that Mr. Nital had held before being incarcerated. Mr. Nital was very instrumental in preparing these four young men for the debate, and to have them participating in something of that nature for the very first time and doing the job that they did was highly commendable.
“I know that the prison is a place for persons who have wronged society. However, these people, once they are in there and they really want to rehabilitate…it is working; the rehabilitation process is working.”
Mills said that when the debate ended and after the judges had rendered their verdict, the debaters expressed their gratitude to the judges for being there and giving up their time “for free” when they could have been engaged in other activities with their families.
He also said that he has one regret, and that is the absence of the media at the debate.
“It was sad to see that no media representative was there to see and hear these young men debate with such eloquence, passion and diction. If this debate were recorded and replayed on national or private radio, or video-taped and shown on the television, people would not have believed that they are prisoners. The words that these people used to highlight their points in argument, some of them were not in my vocabulary and I had never known how to utilise them. They did a very good job and they must be commended for what they are doing on the inside.”
Mills declared that he wants to be a preacher of the Gospel because he had wronged society back in 2009 when he was charged with possession of marijuana.
“Luckily, I was found guilty on one part and was asked to pay a fine and, if it was paid within a particular time I would have my record expunged. I paid the fine and luckily for me I am here, but some of those guys will never come back on this side of the street to be free persons in society.”
He is calling on resource persons in the Federation to make a conscientious effort to visit the inmates and assist the Superintendent of Prisons, Franklyn Dorset, in executing his rehabilitation programme.
“Nothing for the inmates is too simple and is going to be too great. There is no local public speaker that I have listened to on our radio stations that spoke as well as Wycliffe Liburd did at the debate. I am saying this from my heart as an avid debater and as somebody who walked the walk. And it is sad to see that his full potential had to be brought to the fore whilst inside the prison.
“He used words at the debate that I have heard for the very first time…he is full of knowledge. Imagine a man who is incarcerated for murder would tell you that ‘Happiness of most people should be taken into priority when making a decision and not just happiness of mind’. This is a man who, at the end of the debate, stood up and said to the three judges, ‘If I had wronged anyone of you personally or maybe by means of your family in any way, I apologise for that sincerely’.”
Mills is also of the view, like most of the inmates, that the institution should no longer be called Her Majesty’s Prison, but either Dorset’s Correctional Facility or St. Kitts and Nevis Correctional Institution.
Briefly commenting on the role Nital is playing in the correctional institution, Mills said, “Unfortunately, Mr. Nital was incarcerated sometime back for an incident and God does not give anybody more than they can bear. And believe me, because the Lord had a bigger job for Nital to do and maybe that is why he ended up doing what he doing with the young inmates in prison, and it is remarkable.”
In an invited comment, Dorset said, “Apart from the debate, the inmates are being taught Mathematics, English and Principles of Accounts at the CXC level. There is also a basic class of English and Mathematics. We also have projects that the inmates are working on in terms of Agriculture, Masonry, Carpentry and Joinery. I must also say thanks to the officers for recently arranging a Music class for the inmates.
“There is also a significant change in the inmates’ behaviour because of the various programmes with which they are involved. This is not only happening in our Federation, but all over the world the prisons have been changing their systems of incarceration.
“We have been implementing a number of programmes and projects to instill discipline in the inmates even though we are facing a lot of challenges. One of the challenges is the shortage of counsellors; the institution only has one. The inmates are spending most of their time discussing and being involved in positive issue and have discarded the habit of engaging in negative gossips.”
He declared that there is a lot of work still to be done, but in the near future when the new facility would have been completed, “people will really see the true force of the system”.
