T&T is in the throes of a mur­der cri­sis, an un­re­lent­ing wave of crim­i­nal­i­ty dri­ven by gang vi­o­lence and do­mes­tic dis­cord that has been claim­ing lives at an alarm­ing rate. For the year so far, the body count is 195, a marked in­crease from the 115 mur­ders record­ed in the cor­re­spond­ing pe­ri­od last year.  

There has been a steady climb in killings over the last few weeks and a marked ac­cel­er­a­tion in just a few days. This de­mands strong and ur­gent in­ter­ven­tion by the au­thor­i­ties.  

The brazen­ness and bru­tal­i­ty with which the lat­est mur­ders have been com­mit­ted is alarm­ing—the day­light ex­e­cu­tion of a mo­torist in down­town Port-of-Spain; a woman shot as she tried to es­cape from shoot­ers who were pur­su­ing her neigh­bour; a Ch­agua­nas busi­ness­man killed dur­ing a rob­bery.  

With the full re­open­ing of schools for in-per­son class­es, there has been an up­surge in vi­o­lence there too. Add to that the re­cent fa­tal out­comes of fam­i­ly dis­putes, in­clud­ing mur­der-sui­cides, and there can be no deny­ing that the cri­sis has reached epi­dem­ic pro­por­tions.  

This out-of-con­trol vi­o­lence has had a cor­ro­sive ef­fect on T&T’s eco­nom­ic growth and so­cial de­vel­op­ment.  

With all that is tak­ing place, it is time to de­mand ac­tion and an­swers from those in charge of the coun­try’s na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty. They can­not be obliv­i­ous to the re­cent vi­o­lent up­surges and should be ful­ly aware of their re­spon­si­bil­i­ty to ac­count to the na­tion for this wors­en­ing cri­sis.  

There has been a deaf­en­ing si­lence from Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Fitzger­ald Hinds, who is yet to enun­ci­ate a clear and com­pre­hen­sive pol­i­cy for deal­ing with the crime surge, al­though he has held the port­fo­lio for more than a year.  

Mur­der fig­ures for a five-month seg­ment of his tenure, from Oc­to­ber 2021 to Feb­ru­ary 2022, paint a grim pic­ture—250 deaths, an av­er­age of 50 per month.  

Nei­ther Min­is­ter Hinds nor act­ing Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Mc­Don­ald Ja­cobs should be com­fort­able with the sta­tus quo, not when mur­der­ers have the up­per hand and gang­sters go un­chal­lenged as they car­ry out their crim­i­nal ram­pages across the coun­try.  

Si­lence al­so can­not be an op­tion for Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley in his role as head of the Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Coun­cil. He should not lose sight of the fact that every life lost to this crime scourge is one too many. As an elect­ed of­fi­cial in high of­fice, the safe­ty and wel­fare of cit­i­zens is his pri­ma­ry re­spon­si­bil­i­ty.  

There has been a loud and clear call for ac­tion from var­i­ous parts of the coun­try, a de­mand for so­lu­tions that can­not be su­per­fi­cial. Ur­gent mea­sures must be tak­en to re­claim this na­tion from the crim­i­nals and the cor­rupt.  

It is time to make T&T safe again.  

The cur­rent state of the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice, which is once again with­out a full-time com­mis­sion­er, is an im­me­di­ate con­cern. The de­par­ture of Gary Grif­fith from the top post, and the Po­lice Ser­vice Com­mis­sion (PolSC) fi­as­co, in­clud­ing the bungling of the re­cruit­ment process, have cre­at­ed in­sta­bil­i­ty at a time when the TTPS needs strong and con­sis­tent lead­er­ship.  

This sit­u­a­tion is added to the long-stand­ing prob­lems of low morale and in­dis­ci­pline with­in the ranks, rogue of­fi­cers and wan­ing pub­lic con­fi­dence in the TTPS.  

And then there is the vex­ing ques­tion of firearm users’ li­cences. How can it be that law-abid­ing cit­i­zens must wait for the Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er to de­ter­mine their el­i­gi­bil­i­ty to legal­ly car­ry a firearm even though they meet the es­tab­lished cri­te­ri­on, while guns can be rent­ed by the hour and used by mul­ti­ple per­sons to com­mit mur­ders and oth­er crimes?  

Cit­i­zens should be able to pro­tect them­selves, but in­stead, their lives are as ex­pend­able as an­i­mals killed and left to rot on the sides of the na­tion’s high­ways. The Gov­ern­ment is as de­sen­si­tised to the ris­ing body count as are the mo­torists who veer wild­ly away from those rot­ting car­cass­es.

The law-abid­ing cit­i­zens live in dan­ger, while blood­thirsty killers roam freely, tak­ing more lives.

How do we ex­plain to the chil­dren of this na­tion that there is hope for a bet­ter to­mor­row and that some­body cares about what is hap­pen­ing when those with the pow­er to act seem im­mune and un­car­ing about the vi­o­lence and death that is all around? Is there any­one in au­thor­i­ty who un­der­stands what it means to have the life of a loved one bru­tal­ly snuffed out?  

There are many women who are spend­ing this Moth­er’s Day mourn­ing for their mur­dered chil­dren. Spare a thought and a prayer for them, and sober­ly re­flect on the fact that too much has been al­lowed to go wrong for too long.

A mul­ti-faceted ap­proach is need­ed to fix all that has gone wrong in law en­force­ment and na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty.

It is time to re­verse course and erad­i­cate the con­di­tions that draw peo­ple in­to vi­o­lent or crim­i­nal be­hav­iour. This re­quires a sys­tem­at­ic, in­te­grat­ed, co­or­di­nat­ed ap­proach that draws on a wide range of state and non-state ac­tors.  

There needs to be more con­sis­tent de­liv­ery of de­vel­op­men­tal pro­grammes in hotspot com­mu­ni­ties that are di­rect­ed specif­i­cal­ly at those most like­ly to com­mit vi­o­lent crimes, usu­al­ly young males be­tween 14-29 years old. The risk fac­tors for why these young men get in­volved in crim­i­nal­i­ty need to be iden­ti­fied so that re­me­di­al plans that in­volve the fam­i­ly and com­mu­ni­ty can be de­vel­oped.  

The en­gage­ment of all stake­hold­ers—gov­ern­ments, civ­il so­ci­ety or­ga­ni­za­tions, and cit­i­zens—in a se­ri­ous di­a­logue on crime and vi­o­lence, can help in iden­ti­fy­ing more strate­gies to put T&T back on the path of se­cu­ri­ty and pros­per­i­ty.  

Strong lead­er­ship in pol­i­tics, law en­force­ment and across var­i­ous so­cial and eco­nom­ic sec­tors is need­ed to guide this trans­for­ma­tion and de­vel­op a unit­ed front against the crim­i­nals. How­ev­er, progress will be pos­si­ble on­ly if self­ish­ness and self-in­ter­est are set aside, and a stronger sense of so­cial re­spon­si­bil­i­ty and com­mu­ni­ty spir­it is nur­tured in the pop­u­la­tion.  It can be done. It must be done. The blood­let­ting must stop.