For­mer po­lice com­mis­sion­er Gary Grif­fith's de­ci­sion to stay out of the pro­posed an­ti-crime talks be­tween the Gov­ern­ment and Op­po­si­tion is the right move.

It's un­like­ly, how­ev­er, to draw Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley to the ta­ble based on oth­er rea­sons he has giv­en for not want­i­ng to lead Gov­ern­ment's team.

To be­gin with, the Op­po­si­tion's choice to in­clude Grif­fith on its team was noth­ing short of a fu­tile at­tempt to win pub­lic ap­plause, cog­nisant that many ac­cept Grif­fith's tenure as CoP to be more fruit­ful than his suc­ces­sors.

The Op­po­si­tion could not pos­si­bly have thought that seek­ing to im­pose Grif­fith's views up­on the same Prime Min­is­ter who lost faith in him was a mean­ing­ful way to ap­proach these talks.

It served on­ly to ag­gra­vate those on the Gov­ern­ment's side and ex­posed to the pop­u­la­tion a po­lit­i­cal game that trumped the se­ri­ous­ness of cit­i­zens' safe­ty and se­cu­ri­ty.

But the po­lit­i­cal ma­noeu­vres have been on both sides.

Dr Row­ley's in­sis­tence that Grif­fith ought not to be part of the Op­po­si­tion's team was one of many rea­sons he of­fered for stay­ing out of the talks.

At a news con­fer­ence last week, he ar­gued that hav­ing "worked" with Op­po­si­tion mem­bers be­fore, he did not think they want­ed se­ri­ous crime to fall be­cause it would serve their po­lit­i­cal pur­pose.

Dr Row­ley's view of these talks through a po­lit­i­cal lens on­ly sig­nalled to cit­i­zens that the or­der of pri­or­i­ty was wrong, with po­lit­i­cal pos­tur­ing weigh­ing more heav­i­ly on the pros and cons of the talks than any­thing else.

This is not a lux­u­ry Dr Row­ley can af­ford him­self.

He needs no re­mind­ing that of all the politi­cians in this mat­ter, he alone holds the po­si­tion of Prime Min­is­ter of Trinidad and To­ba­go.

How­ev­er le­git­i­mate his con­cerns for po­lit­i­cal gim­mick­ry are, this is a mat­ter of the gov­er­nance of T&T, for which he will ul­ti­mate­ly be held ac­count­able.

The Gov­ern­ment's score­card on crime does not bode well in his favour, as the coun­try en­ters De­cem­ber with the mur­der rate al­ready well above 500.

The promis­es and poli­cies of his Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter and Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er have done noth­ing to curb the spate of killings that con­tin­ue from last year's record high.

Hav­ing the likes of min­is­ters Fitzger­ald Hinds, Mar­vin Gon­za­les, Ran­dall Mitchell, Stu­art Young and At­tor­ney Gen­er­al Regi­nald Ar­mour lead the talks is sim­ply not good enough.

The coun­try is ask­ing for its chief ex­ec­u­tive, Dr Row­ley, to take the reigns by di­min­ish­ing the val­ue he places on the po­lit­i­cal im­pact and by el­e­vat­ing the val­ue he can car­ry to the talks as Prime Min­is­ter, head of the Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Coun­cil and as the lead Prime Min­is­ter for Cari­com Safe­ty and Se­cu­ri­ty.

It has been Dr Row­ley who has re­peat­ed­ly told the coun­try that the Op­po­si­tion's lack of sup­port for an­ti-crime leg­is­la­tion has neg­a­tive­ly im­pact­ed the crime fight.

How, then, does he ex­pect the coun­try to take him se­ri­ous­ly if he ne­glects the op­por­tu­ni­ty to take a lead­ing role with the Op­po­si­tion Leader now?

It is his pres­ence that is more im­por­tant than any oth­er and will al­low both teams to make mean­ing­ful de­ci­sions on the spot, rather than to have his sub­or­di­nates re­port back to him for ap­provals.

Dr Row­ley must dis­play that his pri­or­i­ties lie in the right place by com­ing to the ta­ble and be­ing part of the so­lu­tion to a prob­lem that im­pacts the en­tire coun­try the most.