Akash Sama­roo

Lead Ed­i­tor–Pol­i­tics

akash.sama­roo@cnc3.co.tt

While min­is­ters re­spon­si­ble for na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty re­mained pub­licly silent on the mur­der of 23-month-old Aki­ni Kafi yes­ter­day, For­eign and Cari­com Af­fairs Min­is­ter Sean Sobers said the Gov­ern­ment stands ready to sup­port the griev­ing fam­i­ly and in­sist­ed its an­ti-crime strat­e­gy will soon be­gin bear­ing fruit.

Sobers said the child’s killing was dis­cussed at Cab­i­net and as­sured the na­tion the mat­ter is re­ceiv­ing “ac­tive at­ten­tion” from the Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS), while main­tain­ing con­fi­dence in the Gov­ern­ment’s re­sponse to crime.

The Gov­ern­ment held its post-Cab­i­net me­dia brief­ing yes­ter­day; how­ev­er, on­ly Sobers ad­dressed the me­dia on the ar­rival of In­dia’s Ex­ter­nal Af­fairs Min­is­ter Sub­rah­manyam Jais­hankar. Guardian Me­dia sub­se­quent­ly asked him to state the Gov­ern­ment’s po­si­tion on the Bel­mont tragedy.

“I know in terms of just leav­ing the Cab­i­net Room, this was an is­sue that was dis­cussed. Both Min­is­ters Sturge and Min­is­ter Alexan­der weighed in on the is­sue. I would not wish to get in­to the specifics of what they would have said, but that it is re­ceiv­ing ac­tive at­ten­tion by the Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice, who are ar­du­ous­ly work­ing to bring those crim­i­nals to jus­tice,” Sobers re­spond­ed.

He lament­ed that the loss of life is al­ways dif­fi­cult, but said it is es­pe­cial­ly painful when chil­dren are in­volved.

“On be­half of the Gov­ern­ment of the Re­pub­lic of Trinidad and To­ba­go, our heart goes out to the fam­i­ly. And in what­ev­er way that we can sup­port, as we usu­al­ly do, we will def­i­nite­ly be there for them.”

Sobers said he is sat­is­fied the Gov­ern­ment is do­ing all it can to tack­le crime.

“It is a prob­lem that we have recog­nised, and that we are ac­tive­ly en­gag­ing. We are not run­ning away from the crim­i­nal el­e­ment. We are treat­ing them and fac­ing them head-on. And I think that with­in a short pe­ri­od of time, you would see the fruits of their labour com­ing to ac­tu­al fruition.”

He said mem­bers of the Gov­ern­ment have con­fi­dence in the an­ti-crime plan.

“There are some per­sons who would be er­rant no mat­ter what you put in place.

“The most im­por­tant thing is the job of gov­ern­ment. You have two min­is­ters, you have the TTPS and all the sig­nif­i­cant arms of the se­cu­ri­ty ap­pa­ra­tus work­ing ar­du­ous­ly to ar­rest the sit­u­a­tion. And I think, as I said be­fore, as we work with in­ter­na­tion­al part­ners as well too, you would see a lot of what is ar­chi­tec­ture com­ing in­to place that will demon­strate a re­duc­tion.”

The min­is­ter said TTPS sta­tis­tics show a re­duc­tion in mur­ders.

Asked to com­ment on for­mer prime min­is­ter Stu­art Young’s call for both min­is­ters Roger Alexan­der and Wayne Sturge to re­sign fol­low­ing the killings, Sobers said, “For­mer min­is­ter Young is in no place to give any ad­vice to this Gov­ern­ment, es­pe­cial­ly when it comes to crime and crim­i­nal­i­ty. As a mat­ter of fact, as a fail­ure as a for­mer Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter, and for the short pe­ri­od of time that he was prime min­is­ter as well, the mur­der rate in this coun­try spi­ralled to­tal­ly out of con­trol.”