Clarke says term ‘massa’ is not about race

Finance and the Public Service Minister Dr Nigel Clarke has dismissed claims that his use of the term “Massa Mark” to describe Opposition Leader Mark Golding was a racial slur.

On Tuesday, Clarke rose on Standing Orders 18 to provide an explanation to Parliament on the controversial comment that made headlines and stirred wide public debate on the issue.

Clarke said the objections raised by some against his use of the term “Massa Mark” largely relied upon a misleading imputation of motive and intent.

“I regret that some persons may have viewed my remarks as racially motivated. To again be clear, this was never my intention. To apologise, however, would be to legitimise what simply is not true,” Clarke declared.

He argued that “massa”, in its modern usage, is applied non-racially. “Massa Mark was not about race; Massa Mark was not about colour; Massa is always about an attitude and style regarding power, and that is how I used the term to describe what I saw as the disrespectful attitude and language of the Opposition Leader,” Clarke insisted.

Moving to counter the flood of criticisms for his controversial comment, Clarke pointed out that his remark was meant to draw attention, “in a lighthearted way”, to a “trend by the Opposition Leader to explicitly denigrate others with his choice of words, without him realising the need to account for those words. It is that unaccountable display of power that I described as 'massa'”.

The finance minister said the People's National Party and its affiliates characterised his reference to Golding as “racist”. He also said that The Gleaner accused him of using the “race card”. According to Clarke, “These characterisations of my comments are unfortunate and untrue."

- Edmond Campbell

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