THE HORSES are thundering down the finishing stretch towards the October 16 winning ­ and losing ­post. Not even the pollsters are able to say clearly whether God is awake or asleep. But citizens dare not sleep: "Eternal vigilance is the price of freedom." And the highest stakes are our inalienable, God-given rights and freedoms.

Heather Robinson has resigned as campaign manager because a young activist had taken her aside to show her his tool. The man who is on record declaring, "I have associated with gunmen", is not in the race. Who in the race can say, "I have not associated with gunmen - nor has my party?" No such person will be winning a seat on October 16.

There is not a single horse, not even a female one, who has made the systematic rape of Jamaican women, many of them pubescent girls barely out of infancy, an electoral issue. Should any horse from the urban constituencies where 'rape terrorism' is most rampant make an issue of it he/she is likely to forfeit electoral victory. The unarmed, church-going, protecting angels who can deliver the votes in these 'safe' seats have right of first access to fresh virgin girls.

To be female down the lane is to live in forfeiture of a whole set of fundamental human rights and freedoms that leaders are too blind to see when they are associating with gunmen. The Jamaican woman from the year nought has been too much regarded as chattel, unfortunately often by self as well. The rights to the ownership of self and to security of person are forfeited by gender and geography.

The right to freedom from discrimination on the ground of sex is allowed by the state to be abrogated. The right to enjoy a healthy and productive environment free from the threat of injury, and freedom from inhumane and degrading treatment are infringed by other citizens with virtually no state response.

I am liberally interpreting the provisions of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms to go well beyond the unjustified assumption lurking behind the Bill that the specified rights and freedoms are only, or primarily, with respect to the relationship between citizen and state; rights and freedoms must cover citizen-to-citizen relationships, mediated by the state.

I am giving broad interpretations to concepts like 'discrimination' and 'environment.' Discrimination must include lack of equal protection, lack of equal freedom, lack of equal concern. Environment must include the social and community. The tens of thousands of Jamaicans sentenced to a social environmental hell by garrison politics are being discriminated against, and women, preyed upon by the males of their own community more so than men. All the parties are going to eradicate poverty. Clean these fetid environments first, restore the people's full rights and freedoms and see what happens to poverty.

In the heat of the election campaign several women's groups have launched the Women's Manifesto for the prevention of sexual injustice. They issued an urgent call for stronger political representation to deal with 'rape terrorism' and the protection of women's and children's rights in Jamaica. A friend doing inner-city educational work tells of children wetting and messing up themselves from the sound of any explosion and even from strange men talking loudly. The children have a right 'to enjoy a healthy and productive environment.' All Jamaica's children live in terror.

We have signed all the right international conventions. We have proliferated rights and freedoms like rabbits. The Charter of Rights and Freedoms enumerates 18 rights and freedoms, some clearly redundant being subsumed in others, for examples: freedom of movement and the right to a passport; and freedom of expression, belief and observance of political doctrine, then the right to register and to vote.

But proliferation is not protection; and adequate protection of a handful of broad fundamental rights and freedoms is the critical issue. As the ninth Article of the US Bill of Rights says: "The enumeration in the Constitution of certain rights shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people."

Prime Minister Patterson, pushing his final campaign, says he has invested a great deal of time, effort and political capital on the electoral system to ensure free and fair elections. He has not invested enough time in too many other areas of fundamental rights and freedoms such as this column has been discussing. No Prime Minister has. The monstrous fortress democracy built at the cost of thousands of lives and the general devastation caused by political warfare should not be a source of pride for anyone respectful of rights and freedoms.

The private sector through the PSOJ is gearing up to pressure the new Government to, among other things, control crime and accelerate economic growth and facilitate the emergence of a better society. The business leaders must be careful not to put the cart before the horse. Nothing will thrive for long in the swamp of abuses and failure to protect fundamental rights and freedoms for all persons in a democratic society.

As has been so often demonstrated, to the loss of almost everyone, if justice and fair play do not prevail, the people resort to locking things down and blocking things up. The response of the state can be either to exert control and maintain order by brute force, or to support an orderly and free society through the equitable protection of rights and freedoms.

One area in which the private sector has a large role in rights and freedoms is employment. The Charter of Rights and Freedoms forbids discrimination on the ground of sex, race, place of origin, social class, colour, religion or political opinions. Meandering its way through the Parliament at the same time as The Charter of Rights and Freedoms are "Proposals for the Introduction of Flexible Work Arrangements". In my own submission to the Joint Select Committee, I have placed the matter squarely in terms of a rights and freedoms issue.

The employee has an inherent, inalienable "right and freedom of thought, conscience, belief and observance of religious and political doctrines." Only the right to "life, liberty and security of person" may have had a more profound influence on the development of parliamentary democracy as a guarantor of rights and freedoms, than freedom of conscience. The state, as arbitrator, and defender of rights and freedoms, must scrupulously balance the rights and freedoms of employer and employee.