JavaScript is disabled in your web browser or browser is too old to support JavaScript. Today almost all web pages contain JavaScript, a scripting programming language that runs on visitor's web browser. It makes web pages functional for specific purposes and if disabled for some reason, the content or the functionality of the web page can be limited or unavailable.

Wednesday, July 30, 2025

Action on the crime front?

by

375 days ago
20240721

Last week­end’s mur­der spree dra­mat­i­cal­ly il­lus­trat­ed the dis­tinc­tion be­tween pol­i­tics as per­for­mance and pol­i­tics as de­liv­ery. The num­ber of mur­ders spiked in sharp con­trast to the news con­fer­ences of the pre­vi­ous week in To­ba­go which promised a ro­bust ap­proach.

The “spree” pro­voked a re­sponse de­signed to demon­strate that all hands were on deck and that the noses of na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty per­son­nel were at the prover­bial grind­stone. The CoP and her team as­sured the pub­lic that they could ex­pect in­creased po­lice vis­i­bil­i­ty and that all po­lice sta­tions would be on “high alert”. Sens­ing the grav­i­ty of the sit­u­a­tion and the need for a re­sponse the Prime Min­is­ter con­vened a meet­ing of the Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Coun­cil on Mon­day.

Fol­low­ing the meet­ing, a re­lease from the Of­fice of the Prime Min­is­ter said that Dr Row­ley called for “a more proac­tive, in­tel­li­gence-dri­ven, tar­get­ed and ro­bust ap­proach which is fo­cused on those who are known and sus­pect­ed to be in­volved in se­ri­ous crim­i­nal­i­ty.”

The re­lease al­so not­ed the de­ploy­ment of re­sources in “a co­or­di­nat­ed and col­lab­o­ra­tive man­ner of sus­tained joint op­er­a­tions, par­tic­u­lar­ly in ar­eas where there is a known con­cen­tra­tion of crim­i­nal ac­tiv­i­ty.” These are trite, tired state­ments that have been used, reused, mis­used and abused.

De­spite the TTPS as­ser­tion that se­ri­ous crimes have been re­duced, the mur­der rate is glob­al­ly re­gard­ed as the most im­por­tant crime sta­tis­tic be­cause it in­volves the loss of life. There­fore, the CoP and the TTPS will be judged by their abil­i­ty to re­duce homi­cide. The pub­lic is alarmed by the ob­vi­ous in­abil­i­ty to ad­dress this con­tin­u­ing high mur­der rate.

In 2008, for­mer Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Mar­tin Joseph said that crime would wors­en be­fore any im­prove­ment be­came vis­i­ble. Many bil­lions of dol­lars and 16 years lat­er, suf­fi­cient elapsed to eval­u­ate the im­pact of the 2006 con­sti­tu­tion­al amend­ments to give the po­lice the teeth that were said to be miss­ing. The ev­i­dence is that the leg­isla­tive change has brought no im­prove­ment. What is miss­ing?

Last Thurs­day the coun­try learnt that “high po­lice vis­i­bil­i­ty” meant road­blocks on high­ways and ma­jor roads com­pound­ing the ar­du­ous dai­ly com­mute in­to a mess of ma­jor traf­fic jams rem­i­nis­cent of the”day of to­tal polic­ing”.

This ex­er­cise did not fo­cus on those “known and sus­pect­ed to be in­volved in se­ri­ous crim­i­nal­i­ty.” In­stead, the prac­ti­cal ef­fect of this un­in­tel­li­gent ini­tia­tive was to in­con­ve­nience and pe­nalise law-abid­ing cit­i­zens head­ing to work. This ham-fist­ed demon­stra­tion of po­lice pow­er un­der­mined pub­lic con­fi­dence in the TTPS gen­er­at­ing dis­be­lief and de­ri­sion. It il­lus­trat­ed the ab­sence of any cre­ative prob­lem-solv­ing ca­pac­i­ty in the up­per ech­e­lons of the TTPS.

The mur­der rate speaks for it­self. Cit­i­zens nei­ther need nor want emp­ty ver­bal as­sur­ances that do not ad­dress the facts on the ground. To para­phrase Ein­stein, do­ing or say­ing the same things re­peat­ed­ly can­not give a dif­fer­ent re­sult. It is im­pos­si­ble to ar­gue that the se­cu­ri­ty ser­vices are do­ing their best as the ob­jec­tive re­al­i­ty sug­gests the op­po­site.

The ev­i­dence is that the crime-fight­ing ini­tia­tives, as cur­rent­ly con­fig­ured have failed. Dif­fer­ent ap­proach­es are nec­es­sary. What spe­cif­ic strate­gies or changes are be­ing pro­posed to ad­dress the high mur­der rate and over­all crime sit­u­a­tion?

Fight­ing crime re­quires more ef­fi­cient use of na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty re­sources to achieve bet­ter re­sults. Man­ag­ing these re­sources re­quires po­lit­i­cal will, in­tel­li­gence, com­pe­tence, and align­ment of the strate­gic ob­jec­tive. Why isn’t this hap­pen­ing?


Related articles

Sponsored

Weather

PORT OF SPAIN WEATHER

Sponsored

Today's
Guardian

Publications

Father Anthony Abraham, centre, alongside Jesus Explosion coordinator Lesley Taylor-Gouveia, left, Kerry Ragoobarsingh and Father Ian Taylor, right, pray over the congregation during Jesus Explosion 23 at the Cheryl F Greaves Auditorium, Bishop Anstey High School East, Trincity, on July 19.

Father Anthony Abraham, centre, alongside Jesus Explosion coordinator Lesley Taylor-Gouveia, left, Kerry Ragoobarsingh and Father Ian Taylor, right, pray over the congregation during Jesus Explosion 23 at the Cheryl F Greaves Auditorium, Bishop Anstey High School East, Trincity, on July 19.

Father Anthony Abraham, centre, alongside Jesus Explosion coordinator Lesley Taylor-Gouveia, left, Kerry Ragoobarsingh and Father Ian Taylor, right, pray over the congregation during Jesus Explosion 23 at the Cheryl F Greaves Auditorium, Bishop Anstey High School East, Trincity, on July 19.

Father Anthony Abraham, centre, alongside Jesus Explosion coordinator Lesley Taylor-Gouveia, left, Kerry Ragoobarsingh and Father Ian Taylor, right, pray over the congregation during Jesus Explosion 23 at the Cheryl F Greaves Auditorium, Bishop Anstey High School East, Trincity, on July 19.

Jesus Explosion 23: Visiting priest feeds RC faithful

Yesterday
Minister of Rural Development and Local Government Khadijah Ameen, right, presents Israel Khan, SC, with the Aneal Rajah Windball Cricket League Street Recognition Award while Rajah congratulates him during a ceremony at the St Augustine South Recreation Ground two Sundays ago.

Minister of Rural Development and Local Government Khadijah Ameen, right, presents Israel Khan, SC, with the Aneal Rajah Windball Cricket League Street Recognition Award while Rajah congratulates him during a ceremony at the St Augustine South Recreation Ground two Sundays ago.

Courtesy Aneal Rajah Windball Cricket League

Minister of Rural Development and Local Government Khadijah Ameen, right, presents Israel Khan, SC, with the Aneal Rajah Windball Cricket League Street Recognition Award while Rajah congratulates him during a ceremony at the St Augustine South Recreation Ground two Sundays ago.

Minister of Rural Development and Local Government Khadijah Ameen, right, presents Israel Khan, SC, with the Aneal Rajah Windball Cricket League Street Recognition Award while Rajah congratulates him during a ceremony at the St Augustine South Recreation Ground two Sundays ago.

Courtesy Aneal Rajah Windball Cricket League

Israel Khan honoured by community cricket league

Yesterday
SSCasa chairman Eudaine Garcia meets Guyana President Irfaan Ali

SSCasa chairman Eudaine Garcia meets Guyana President Irfaan Ali

SSCasa chairman Eudaine Garcia meets Guyana President Irfaan Ali

SSCasa chairman Eudaine Garcia meets Guyana President Irfaan Ali

SSCasa steps up Caricom collaboration after summit

2 days ago
Then acting Minister of Foreign and Caricom Affairs Barry Padarath, right, toasts with Argentina Ambassador Gustavo Martinez Pandiani during the Argentine National Day function at the Renassaince Club Room, The Renaissance at Shorelands, on July 9.

Then acting Minister of Foreign and Caricom Affairs Barry Padarath, right, toasts with Argentina Ambassador Gustavo Martinez Pandiani during the Argentine National Day function at the Renassaince Club Room, The Renaissance at Shorelands, on July 9.

ANISTO ALVES

Then acting Minister of Foreign and Caricom Affairs Barry Padarath, right, toasts with Argentina Ambassador Gustavo Martinez Pandiani during the Argentine National Day function at the Renassaince Club Room, The Renaissance at Shorelands, on July 9.

Then acting Minister of Foreign and Caricom Affairs Barry Padarath, right, toasts with Argentina Ambassador Gustavo Martinez Pandiani during the Argentine National Day function at the Renassaince Club Room, The Renaissance at Shorelands, on July 9.

ANISTO ALVES

Argentina wants to export world-famous beef to T&T

2 days ago