GEISHA KOW­LESSAR-ALON­ZO

Se­nior Re­porter

geisha.kow­lessar@guardian.co.tt

As na­tion­al ten­sions rise over crime, po­lice con­duct, and mount­ing calls for the Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice Al­lis­ter Gue­var­ro to step down, three of the coun­try’s busi­ness or­gan­i­sa­tions are urg­ing a calm, bal­anced, and non­po­lit­i­cal ap­proach to the coun­try’s deep­en­ing se­cu­ri­ty chal­lenges—is­sues that con­tin­ue to im­pact cit­i­zens, com­mu­ni­ties and the wider busi­ness sec­tor.

Pub­lic out­rage in­ten­si­fied over the week­end fol­low­ing the po­lice-in­volved killing of 31-year-old Joshua Sama­roo and the shoot­ing of his wife, Ka­ia Sealy.

The case has fu­elled wide­spread anger, sharp­ened scruti­ny of the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS), and reignit­ed the na­tion­al de­bate about crime, pub­lic trust and po­lice ac­count­abil­i­ty.

Against this back­drop, four busi­ness or­gan­i­sa­tions—Ch­agua­nas Cham­ber of In­dus­try and Com­merce (CCIC), Greater Tu­na­puna Cham­ber of In­dus­try and Com­merce (GT­CIC), Greater San Fer­nan­do Area Cham­ber Of Com­merce and the Ari­ma Busi­ness As­so­ci­a­tion—is­sued state­ments urg­ing calm, con­struc­tive en­gage­ment, trans­par­ent in­ves­ti­ga­tion and na­tion­al uni­ty as the coun­try grap­ples with in­ten­si­fy­ing se­cu­ri­ty con­cerns.

Three of the four cham­bers aligned around calls for ac­count­abil­i­ty, in­sti­tu­tion­al strength­en­ing and con­struc­tive di­a­logue in­stead of po­lit­i­cal con­fronta­tion, while the Ari­ma Busi­ness As­so­ci­a­tion open­ly voiced its sup­port for the Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice.

“Crime re­mains a se­ri­ous con­cern, and the busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty con­tin­ues to ex­pect mea­sur­able re­sults, sus­tained en­force­ment, and con­sis­tent en­gage­ment. Where progress is ob­served, it should be ac­knowl­edged, where gaps ex­ist, they must be ad­dressed con­struc­tive­ly.”

“The cham­ber’s fo­cus re­mains on out­comes rather than per­son­al­i­ties or pol­i­tics. We sup­port ef­forts that leads to safer com­mu­ni­ties, re­duced crime, and a sta­ble en­vi­ron­ment in which busi­ness­es can op­er­ate and grow,” the CCIC’s pres­i­dent Bal­dath Ma­haraj said.

Mean­while, the Greater San Fer­nan­do Area Cham­ber of Com­merce said it has tak­en care­ful note of grow­ing pub­lic calls for the com­mis­sion­er to re­sign, de­scrib­ing the cur­rent cli­mate as one of deep frus­tra­tion and fear, es­pe­cial­ly with cit­i­zens de­mand­ing ur­gent ac­tion against vi­o­lent crime and gang war­fare.

While recog­nis­ing these pub­lic sen­ti­ments, the cham­ber stressed the im­por­tance of a thor­ough, in­de­pen­dent, and trans­par­ent in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to the re­cent shoot­ing in­ci­dent.

Pres­i­dent Ki­ran Singh called for full clar­i­ty on the cir­cum­stances sur­round­ing the shoot­ing which it said is es­sen­tial to restor­ing con­fi­dence in both the TTPS and the wider jus­tice sys­tem.

“The pub­lic has been cry­ing out for more ac­tion against crim­i­nal ac­tiv­i­ty and in par­tic­u­lar, gang war­fare. We al­so ac­knowl­edge the frus­tra­tion be­ing felt by many cit­i­zens and busi­ness op­er­a­tors, par­tic­u­lar­ly small and medi­um-sized en­ter­pris­es, who con­tin­ue to face the eco­nom­ic and so­cial fall­out of crim­i­nal ac­tiv­i­ty. Per­sis­tent in­se­cu­ri­ty in­creas­es op­er­at­ing costs, dis­cour­ages in­vest­ment, and af­fects the vi­bran­cy of com­mer­cial cen­tres such as San Fer­nan­do,” Ma­haraj ex­plained as he added, “We still be­lieve in the mot­to of the TTPS: “To Pro­tect and Serve with PRIDE.”

The GT­CIC al­so high­light­ed the wide­spread anx­i­ety felt across the coun­try, as pres­i­dent Ra­mon Gre­go­rio not­ed that crime and pub­lic safe­ty con­cerns con­tin­ue to dis­rupt com­mu­ni­ties and busi­ness op­er­a­tions.

It ac­knowl­edged the dif­fi­cult con­di­tions un­der which po­lice of­fi­cers work and com­mend­ed those who con­tin­ue to per­form their du­ties de­spite sig­nif­i­cant chal­lenges.

The or­gan­i­sa­tion urged calm, re­spon­si­ble di­a­logue and said that strength­en­ing in­sti­tu­tion­al ca­pac­i­ty, im­prov­ing polic­ing ef­fec­tive­ness, and re­build­ing pub­lic con­fi­dence must be na­tion­al pri­or­i­ties.

The Ari­ma Busi­ness Cham­ber, how­ev­er, took a dif­fer­ent stance.

It stat­ed firm­ly that the com­mis­sion­er does not need to step down, ar­gu­ing that he has al­ready as­sured the pub­lic that a full in­ves­ti­ga­tion would take place and that ap­pro­pri­ate ac­tions would fol­low—as has oc­curred in pri­or in­ci­dents.

“The TTPS has our full sup­port in their up­hill bat­tle against crime. The com­mis­sion­er has a very chal­leng­ing job and needs the sup­port from the en­tire coun­try. The cur­rent in­ci­dent is one for con­cern and war­rants his at­ten­tion to prop­er­ly ad­dress but it does not war­rant his res­ig­na­tion. It re­quires his in­ter­ven­tion and man­age­ment skills,” Ari­ma Busi­ness Cham­ber pres­i­dent Sudesh Ramkissoon stat­ed.