Asked if he agreed with the im­ple­men­ta­tion of the lim­it­ed state of emer­gency, Op­po­si­tion Leader Kei­th Row­ley said: "I don't know what it means. It is lim­it­ed to what, and to where." Row­ley said it was very sur­pris­ing that this de­ci­sion did not form any part of a na­tion­al de­bate and he said that that was an in­di­ca­tion of the "con­flicts and con­tra­dic­tions" in the Gov­ern­ment's po­si­tion on crime.

He said: "My un­der­stand­ing of this is that, notwith­stand­ing the re­cent Her­culean ef­forts by the Gov­ern­ment to hood­wink the pop­u­la­tion that crime is un­der con­trol, the Gov­ern­ment now cuts a sor­ry sight in that they have been forced to ad­mit that they have lost con­trol of the sit­u­a­tion."

The Op­po­si­tion Leader said the de­ci­sion by the Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Coun­cil to im­ple­ment the lim­it­ed state of emer­gency was con­fir­ma­tion that the 15-month tenure of the Peo­ple's Part­ner­ship ad­min­is­tra­tion had brought no im­prove­ment in the crime sit­u­a­tion. Row­ley said it was an in­di­ca­tion that "crim­i­nals are in charge...while the Gov­ern­ment is en­gag­ing in pub­lic re­la­tions gim­mick­ry."

He lashed out at the Prime Min­is­ter for "spurn­ing in a most of­fen­sive way," the Op­po­si­tion's of­fer of talks on the crime sit­u­a­tion. "Since they have said that the state of emer­gency is go­ing to im­pact hot spots, are they go­ing to be in ar­eas in which the Gov­ern­ment has re­moved po­lice posts?" Row­ley said. "Be­cause we have not­ed an up­surge of crime in the ar­eas in which the po­lice posts have been re­moved."