Jamaica Diaspora Annual Roundup 2012

Annual Review | Published: 31 December 2012 | Jamaica Homes News

Key Takeaways: 2012 in Six Lines

• London Olympics: Bolt Wins Second Triple Gold; Jamaica Dominates Sprints
• 5th Biennial Jamaica Diaspora Conference Strengthens Institutional Ties
• Obama Wins US Re-Election in November Against Mitt Romney
• Simpson Miller’s Second Administration Pursues IMF Economic Reform
• Sandy Hook School Shooting December 14: Diaspora Grief Nationwide
• Jamaica Remittances Approach US$2.1 Billion

The Year in Review

2012 was, for Jamaica’s diaspora communities, the year London came home. The 2012 Summer Olympics — staged in the city that is home to the world’s largest Jamaican diaspora community outside the Caribbean — provided the most intimate possible convergence of diaspora geography and sporting spectacle. Usain Bolt’s second consecutive triple gold — 100m, 200m, and 4x100m relay — made him the first man in history to successfully defend both sprint titles at consecutive Olympics. Jamaica’s women produced a sprint treble of their own: Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce, Veronica Campbell-Brown, and Blessing Okagbare taking medals across the 100m and 200m finals. The Olympic Stadium at Stratford became, on the nights of Jamaica’s athletics finals, a temporary extension of the British-Jamaican community’s collective identity — a place where the flags and the voices and the pride merged into something that no passport or residency status could fully contain.

The 5th Biennial Jamaica Diaspora Conference, held under Portia Simpson Miller’s returning PNP administration, consolidated the institutional framework that by its fifth edition was a mature, multi-lateral accountability structure. Simpson Miller’s second administration’s domestic focus was economic reform: Jamaica’s engagement with an IMF Extended Fund Facility programme required fiscal consolidation, public sector restructuring, and debt reduction measures that were simultaneously necessary for long-term stability and immediately painful for public service users. Barack Obama’s re-election in November over Mitt Romney — with a stronger-than-expected margin in the Electoral College — was celebrated in diaspora communities as the affirmation of a presidency rather than its historic inauguration. Hurricane Sandy, which struck the US East Coast on 29 October, damaged diaspora communities in New York and New Jersey with particular severity. The Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting of 14 December, which killed twenty children and six staff, produced a depth of communal grief across the United States that crossed every community boundary, including the diaspora’s. Annual remittances to Jamaica were approaching US$2.1 billion, a new record that reflected the improving economic position of diaspora households in the post-recession recovery.

Jamaica Diaspora Annual Roundup 2012 | Jamaica Homes News. Compiled from four quarterly editions published April, July, October 2012, and January 2013.

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