Against the smoldering backdrop of burned police stations, bullet-scarred walls and wrecked reputations, West Kingston emerges from the rubble after days of intense fighting between Jamaica's security forces and the heavily armed gunmen who have barricaded garrison communities to protect Christopher "Dudus" Coke, Tivoli Gardens' alleged gun and drug runner.

Jamaica Defense Force (JDF) soldiers pushed through cement blockades, wired explosives and booby traps to engage gunmen in what has now become a futile attempt to capture and serve Coke with a U.S. extradition arrest warrant. Kingston and St. Andrew remain in a state of emergency for the next 30 days, and a strong police presence remains in Tivoli Gardens for the foreseeable future.

From the blanket of an unprecedented media blackout surface questionable death toll figures and stories of horror, inhumanity and brutality, which come from soldiers following orders to "kill anything that moved." The official body count is 73, but former Prime Minister Edward Seaga and several sources put the death toll at well over 100.

Many people have lost a family member or a neighbor, and stories abound of bodies being burned, dumped or left decomposing. More than 700 men have been detained, among them 50 who were wanted by the police for a variety of crimes. Most will be fingerprinted and released.

In total, 28 guns, 8,885 rounds of ammunition and an assortment of explosive devices have been confiscated, along with military uniforms and other paraphernalia. According to sources from the newspaper Jamaica Gleaner, devices found were "similar to those which are seen on the ground in Afghanistan, including steel used for a bombing system, LPG cylinders laced with explosives carefully set up as booby traps, Molotov cocktails used as firebombs, and sharpened scrap metals set to mangle the unsuspecting. Many of these were wired electrically with hair trigger along with hundreds of gallons of petrol."

Members of the security forces reported finding extradition documents and other sensitive materials in Coke's Tivoli office, providing further evidence that he was assisted by members of a select, influential circle. Ordinarily, extradition documents are shared only with a subject's attorney after the subject is arrested. Beleaguered Prime Minister Bruce Golding, hobbled by a smorgasbord of indiscretions and miscalculations, is now seeking to dig himself and his constituents out from the catastrophic fallout. Yet still, no Coke.

Tivoli Gardens, the mother of all garrisons, is now fortified by armed soldiers of a different sort; checkpoints manned by police and guards are interspersed throughout the traumatized community. Leighton "Levity" Coke, Dudus' brother, has been taken into custody, and the hunt for Coke has now shifted, perhaps to where it should have been in the first place.

In their quest for Coke, soldiers are now searching the elegantly appointed hilltop mansions in the exclusive suburbs of St. Andrew. They are digging up homes and lawns of his undercover affiliates and abettors and exposing open secrets. Golding and the law enforcement arm have taken this opportunity to clean house. To wrest control of Tivoli and Denham and Hannah Towns away from Coke's supporters and to find the phantom himself, police and soldiers leave no stone unturned.

From behind bullet-splintered walls and bombed shacks are tales of woe and devastation. Residents report being beaten, shot, and terrorized by police and soldiers, their houses looted and destroyed. One man recounts being beaten and pistol-whipped in front of his wife and children with five seconds to tell what he knew. Men and boys between the ages of 17 and 35 were seemingly targeted, perhaps as insurance and discouragement against future Tivoli uprisings and to deplete future intra-state armies.

Those returning from detention describe "pigsty" facilities, with no toilet accommodations and soldiers' boot heels to the face for the unlucky. Some lucky ones are making a run for survival, scampering to parts unknown for a different life. The stories from the women and men who survived the carnage are gruesome and shaming. Cowed and traumatized, not all are Coke conspirators, and many say that despite being urged by police and the media to leave Tivoli before the assault, many were afraid that if they did they would be killed or their homes would be looted and destroyed. Worse yet, to what would they return? Some Jamaicans dismiss them as Coke loyalists who've at last gotten their just desserts: They live in the muck, let them die in it. But how will the children survive?

Dodged A Bullet?
Now that the ugly truth of corruption, influence and collusion has been laid bare, what will Jamaica's political landscape looks like in the aftermath? Having narrowly survived a vote of no-confidence initiated by the People's National Party (PNP), Golding's political future and credibility remain in the balance. Opposition Leader and former Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller has said "Golding corrupted both the justice and governance system of the country. ... His actions had destroyed Jamaica's good name, and... the office of the prime minister had been brought into disrepute."

Yesterday, Golding visited Tivoli for the first time since the fighting ebbed. At the same time, relatives of the deceased identified photographs of those killed at the Tivoli Gardens community center and the Denham Town police station. Now that the mask has been peeled away, many are coming to grips with how dispensable their community was despite their fervent support for it. Golding's visit -- from which the press was barred -- was greeted by many with disdain, scorn and cries of "away with Bruce!"

To save itself from complete disgrace and continued international drubbing, the administration has fast-tracked the anti-crime bills that have languished in parliament for years faster than you can say "tourism walloped." What Coke knows remains a mystery, and the PNP's dogged inquiries into the Manatt hiring scandal seems to have been staved off -- for now.

Ostensibly, Golding has rooted out the criminal -- albeit government sanctioned -- elements and instituted state-run law and order. To that end, four new police posts will be set up throughout Tivoli. Now, perhaps a more honest, mutually beneficial relationship can develop between police and undeserved communities. No doubt the police and security forces empower and bolster the confidence of honest police who've found it difficult to stomach crime and corruption and sometimes within their own ranks.

But can politicians learn a new way of doing business and develop viable economic solutions for these garrisons and find ways to reintegrate them into mainstream society? Can politicians understand the folly of spending $60 million to renovate their official residences while their constituents wallow in squalor, infrastructure crumbles and civil servants strike for decent wages?

The opposition's trade and security leaders have no confidence in Golding's ability to lead CARICOM, an organization of 15 Caribbean head of nations and dependencies, and are no doubt squirming with the hypocrisy of it all.

Talk about irony and bad timing: Jamaica is due to accept the CARICOM chairmanship in July.