Cliff Twang trying to ‘cross it’ to prosperity

It's almost 10 years since Clifton 'Cliff Twang' Brown stood at the banks of the menacing Yallahs River, which seemed to be in a mad rush to sweep downstream anyone and anything that dared crossing it. The raging water, emboldened from days of heavy rains, left a section of Robertsfield, St Andrew, marooned. This has been a recurring decimal for residents of this rural St Andrew community, located just outside of Mavis Bank, as they are often cut off whenever the Robertsfield ford is flooded.

In June 2011, Television Jamaica (TVJ) reporter Dara Smith went to the area and interviewed Brown against the backdrop of the muddy, raging Yallahs River. Cliff Twang captured the imagination of Jamaicans with four words - 'Nobody cannot cross it'. He became an overnight celebrity after DJ Powa remixed his interview into a song.

After getting immense popularity from the Nobody Canna Cross It remix, Cliff Twang received an endorsement from telecommunications company LIME (now FLOW).

"In 2011, when I became famous on TV, in the paper and all over the world, it gave me a real change in my life. I got a lot of experiences and if I should live my life over again, I would have tried to do better," he said.

"I got a chance to travel overseas and I got a chance to handle little more dollars, but to tell you di truth, right now my pocket is empty. I need some money to spend. My family needs money, because money answers all calls in life, just like prayer. Everywhere yuh go, yuh need money to spend, so right now I need a little bit of money."

Cliff Twang is also considering an entertainment career.

"I would still like to sing, so I am thinking about doing some voice training, and so on. I love music and I want to be able to provide for my family correctly. I love music like how I love the women dem, yuh know, because I cannot do nothing without the girls dem," he said.

However, money and girls are not the only things on his mind. Cliff Twang wants more to be done for Robertsfield and surrounding areas.

"In 2011, nobody could cross it, and now in 2021, sometimes somebody can cross it. The road got asphalted and people who didn't know about Robertsfield and Mavis Bank knew about it. I helped to make this community famous," he said.

He, however, stated that there is still work to be done and is imploring the Government to focus on Mavis Bank.

"We still have a lot of landslides, and whenever it rains we still get marooned. When rain fall, the water will rise all eight feet above the bridge. Right now, if the rain fall for 24 hours, no one still canna cross it," he said. "Right now, the debris deh right up to the bridge, so we need a big 'tractavator' to stay in the community to help clean the road. Right now, we cannot drive to Papine, again, and that is our closest town. The place tear away since the heavy rains, but thank God there is a bit of work being done."

"I would want to see the streets of Robertsfield being swept and more shops and restrooms. I want to see hotels and more jobs. I want to see more food, because food is the staff of life," he added.