Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley yes­ter­day an­nounced that the State will re­dou­ble ef­forts and hunt down per­pe­tra­tors of vi­o­lence.

And Pres­i­dent Chris­tine Kan­ga­loo has called out 100 mem­bers of the T&T Vol­un­teer De­fence Force to boost sup­port for the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice from Oc­to­ber 30 un­til Car­ni­val 2024.

Row­ley’s terse warn­ing and Kan­ga­loo’s procla­ma­tion for more De­fence Force as­sis­tance fol­lowed the re­cent spate of eight mur­ders in 24 hours in Ari­ma, Bel­mont and Diego Mar­tin be­tween Sun­day and Mon­day night. Some 481 peo­ple have been mur­dered in T&T so far this year.

Row­ley re­leased a state­ment ear­ly yes­ter­day no­ti­fy­ing the pub­lic that Gov­ern­ment was re­dou­bling ef­forts to cur­tail acts of vi­o­lence.

The Prime Min­is­ter said, “Notwith­stand­ing the per­sis­tent ef­forts of the var­i­ous state ma­chin­ery, the se­lec­tion of vi­o­lence as a way of life, the love af­fair and glam­ouri­sa­tion of firearms and the wan­ton dis­re­gard for hu­man life in Trinidad and To­ba­go has now gone be­yond con­cern­ing to the ridicu­lous.

“This in­tractable sit­u­a­tion now de­mands that the law-abid­ing cit­i­zens be giv­en the right to their peace and safe­ty above the free­dom of the law­less and the vi­o­lent few who op­er­ate with im­puni­ty.”

Row­ley, who heads the Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Coun­cil, warned, “The cur­rent vi­o­lent crime spree will not be tol­er­at­ed. The State will re­dou­ble all ef­forts to cur­tail these vi­o­lent out­bursts, will hunt down and dis­arm the per­pe­tra­tors and will make op­er­a­tional ad­just­ments so that the state se­cu­ri­ty ser­vices can act with dis­patch against the vi­o­lent co­hort of our na­tion­al pop­u­la­tion.”

Mean­while, the Oc­to­ber 30 procla­ma­tion of a le­gal no­tice by Kan­ga­loo, who is Com­man­der in Chief of the Armed Forces, cir­cu­lat­ed on so­cial me­dia yes­ter­day.

The no­tice stat­ed that Sec­tion 238(1) of the De­fence Act, Chap 14:01 pro­vides that the Pres­i­dent “... May call out the Vol­un­teer De­fence Force or any por­tion of it for ac­tu­al mil­i­tary ser­vice with their arms and am­mu­ni­tion, in aid of the civ­il pow­er in any case in which a ri­ot, dis­tur­bance of the peace, or oth­er emer­gency re­quir­ing such ser­vice oc­curs, or is, in the opin­ion of the Pres­i­dent, an­tic­i­pat­ed as like­ly to oc­cur, and in ei­ther case to be be­yond the pow­ers of the civ­il au­thor­i­ties to sup­press, or to pre­vent, or deal with.”

The procla­ma­tion said the Pres­i­dent “deems it nec­es­sary to call out to du­ty, 100 mem­bers of the T&T Vol­un­teer De­fence Force to strength­en T&T De­fence Force ca­pa­bil­i­ty to­wards the ful­fil­ment of op­er­a­tional sup­port to the TTPS in the pro­vi­sion of a safe and se­cure en­vi­ron­ment dur­ing the pre-Christ­mas sea­son to the 2024 Car­ni­val pe­ri­od.”

The 123-day pe­ri­od is from Oc­to­ber 30, 2023 to Feb­ru­ary 29, 2024—span­ning the 2024 Car­ni­val pe­ri­od, when se­cu­ri­ty is al­ways height­ened.

Kam­la: Row­ley putting PR plas­ter on prob­lem

How­ev­er, ad­dress­ing the PM’s state­ment yes­ter­day, Op­po­si­tion Leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar said, “Row­ley at­tempts to ap­pear tough but can­not con­tin­ue putting a pub­lic re­la­tions plas­ter on a crime prob­lem that re­quires holis­tic plans with mea­sur­able ob­jec­tives. The use of se­lec­tive fake out­rage for pub­lic re­la­tions will not lessen the vi­o­lent crime cri­sis.

“Many ex­perts, in­di­vid­u­als and en­ti­ties want to con­tribute to the an­ti-crime fight. I urge Kei­th Row­ley to put aside his fears, re­con­sid­er his re­fusal to at­tend the crime talks and in­clude all will­ing stake­hold­ers to in­crease the ex­per­tise avail­able to the Gov­ern­ment.”

She said, “Ac­cept­ing help in the an­ti-crime fight should not be viewed as a weak­ness; hu­mil­i­ty and co-op­er­a­tive­ness are signs of con­fi­dence and strength. No cit­i­zen wants to see a con­tin­u­a­tion of the vi­o­lent crime cri­sis.”

Per­sad-Bisses­sar said nowhere in T&T is now safe. “Cit­i­zens are be­ing mur­dered and robbed in broad day­light, they’re pris­on­ers in their homes, preyed up­on and ter­rorised by vi­o­lent crim­i­nals. The Prime Min­is­ter in­di­cat­ed that the ‘wan­ton dis­re­gard for hu­man life in T&T has NOW gone be­yond con­cern­ing to the ridicu­lous’. In the view of many cit­i­zens, the crime cri­sis in T&T has been ridicu­lous for the past eight years!”

She said, “Yet, he re­fus­es to meet with and ac­cept help from all stake­hold­ers to bat­tle the cri­sis. Many ex­perts, in­di­vid­u­als and en­ti­ties who are will­ing to meet at the crime talks and work with the Gov­ern­ment are be­ing shunned and ex­clud­ed for no sen­si­ble rea­son. In the face of his re­fusal to meet will­ing stake­hold­ers and out­right re­jec­tion of their help, in­sult is added to in­jury as the in­com­pe­tent Fitzger­ald Hinds re­mains at the head of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty.”

Per­sad-Bisses­sar said the PM’s “pub­lic re­la­tions so­cial me­dia post is the usu­al pat­tern of the Row­ley-led Gov­ern­ment and there was no fo­cus on the root caus­es of crime and the un­der­ly­ing so­cio-eco­nom­ic prob­lems that dri­ve this is­sue”.

“The Gov­ern­ment must stop fight­ing against law-abid­ing cit­i­zens who want to help in the an­ti-crime fight and start co-op­er­at­ing. No cit­i­zen, in­clud­ing every mem­ber of the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress, wants to see a con­tin­u­a­tion of the vi­o­lent crime cri­sis. The Gov­ern­ment should ac­cept the help on of­fer!” she added.