Rad­hi­ca De Sil­va

Se­nior Re­porter

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

Mo­torists who thought they were be­ing stopped for dri­ving in­frac­tions, were in­stead hand­ed Di­vali sweets, food, and drinks along the St Mary’s Main Road in Moru­ga on Thurs­day night.

The ges­ture was part of a new ef­fort by po­lice to re­build trust in the St Mary’s com­mu­ni­ty, which has long been plagued by crime.

Speak­ing to Guardian Me­dia, St Mary’s Po­lice Com­mu­ni­ty Coun­cil sec­re­tary, Anisa Khan-Mo­hammed, said the ini­tia­tive, held days be­fore the fes­ti­val of lights, was aimed at bridg­ing the gap be­tween law en­force­ment and res­i­dents, many of whom say years of vi­o­lence, mis­trust, and tragedy had left deep scars.

“Tonight, what we’re do­ing is an ini­tia­tive be­ing dri­ven by the oc­ca­sion,” Khan-Mo­hammed told Guardian Me­dia.

“We, along with the St Mary’s Po­lice, de­cid­ed to use events like Di­vali to bring aware­ness to the com­mu­ni­ty and to give back in some small way.”

She said the ef­fort was made pos­si­ble through col­lab­o­ra­tion be­tween the St Mary’s Com­mu­ni­ty Coun­cil, the St Mary’s Po­lice Sta­tion, and spon­sors who pooled re­sources to host the evening’s sur­prise road ac­tiv­i­ty.

“We had a lit­tle cre­ative twist tonight,” Khan-Mo­hammed said.

“We stopped ve­hi­cles—peo­ple thought it was a road­block—but in­stead, we gave back to the com­mu­ni­ty in the form of sweets and meals.”

She said the ges­ture was de­signed to chal­lenge per­cep­tions about law en­force­ment and show res­i­dents that of­fi­cers could be both present and ap­proach­able.

“We’re try­ing to bridge that gap be­tween the stereo­type that the com­mu­ni­ty has of the of­fi­cers and what they ac­tu­al­ly do when they come out here every day,” she ex­plained.

“The per­cep­tion that a lot of res­i­dents have of the po­lice right now, and not just in this com­mu­ni­ty but na­tion­wide, may not be a very pos­i­tive one. We want to re­in­force trust and show that the po­lice are here, they’re re­li­able, and they’re ac­ces­si­ble.”

Khan-Mo­hammed said the coun­cil plans to con­tin­ue us­ing na­tion­al and re­li­gious hol­i­days to con­nect with res­i­dents, es­pe­cial­ly in ar­eas where pub­lic con­fi­dence in the po­lice has erod­ed.

“We have been down­trod­den by a lot of crime and crim­i­nal ac­tiv­i­ty,” she said. “What we are try­ing to do now is take back the com­mu­ni­ty by im­ple­ment­ing dif­fer­ent ini­tia­tives that bring peo­ple to­geth­er and bring a smile to their faces.”

Among those in at­ten­dance were rel­a­tives of crime vic­tims, in­clud­ing the sur­viv­ing fam­i­ly of St Mary’s busi­ness­man En­ri­co Guer­ra and his five-year-old daugh­ter, Ani­ka, who were killed in Au­gust last year.

As po­lice of­fi­cers hand­ed out box­es of food and bags of sweets, Khan-Mo­hammed said she hoped the col­lab­o­ra­tion would spark last­ing change.

“We want peo­ple to know that the of­fi­cers are here,” she said.

“We ex­ist, and we’re ready to work with them again.”