It all started when Basil Waite wrote a letter to the Gleaner’s editor questioning whether TVJ’s two-year ban on KC’s Schools Challenge quiz team was fair and on what basis had the media house made such a ruling.
Several other letters soon appeared in both the Gleaner and the Observer with titles such as “Do the Right Thing, TVJ,” “TVJ invented Absalam” and “TVJ Needs to Answer.”
These letters have served to keep a spotlight on the quiz match between Campion and KC in this year’s competition in which Campion was declared the winner after the judges ruled that KC had mispronounced the name of the biblical character “Absalom.” The judges heard “Absalam” while everyone else heard “Absalom.”
The two-year ban was slapped on KC when one of the school’s coaches, Kenyatta Powell, complained on social media of what he perceived to be unfair treatment by TVJ during the Campion match.
The school has filed a formal appeal of the suspension.
In the meantime, the Old Boys are making their case in the court of public opinion. They have taken to the airwaves as well as the newspapers.
They are asking, is it right to punish the KC students for the actions of a coach and does TVJ have the right to punish free speech? And as Basil Waite put it in his letter, can TVJ "abrogate, abridge and infringe" Jamaican rights, just so?