The men fu­elling the on­go­ing war in Co­corite need to fear their sins rather than their en­e­mies.

This was the mes­sage com­mu­ni­ty ac­tivist David “Buffy” Mail­lard yes­ter­day sent to mem­bers of the Ras­ta City and Mus­lim gangs who have been en­gaged in an all-out feud which led to Tues­day’s brazen shoot­ing of Dwayne King on the Beetham High­way dur­ing rush hour traf­fic. King, 40, a prac­tis­ing Mus­lim in Co­corite, was shot four times by masked gun­men as he sat in his car in the west­bound lane of the high­way.

Yes­ter­day, Mail­lard spoke about the coun­try’s gang war­fare on CNC3’s Morn­ing Brew, say­ing the first thing we need to do as adults was to talk about the sit­u­a­tion.

Asked why the po­lice were not rop­ing in the gang lead­ers, Mail­lard said the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice has been try­ing its best al­though oth­ers begged to dis­agree. He said drugs and guns con­tin­ue to en­ter T&T from Colom­bia, Bo­livia and Venezuela on cred­it.

“You leave one of your fam­i­ly mem­bers... we give you drugs. You don’t pay we kill them. That is how it works, so don’t tell me the mon­ey is buy­ing drugs and guns,” Mail­lard said as he ex­plained how some of the trans­ac­tions are con­duct­ed.

He said the own­ers of the Ras­ta City gang were not the gang lead­ers but the so­ci­ety.

“You and I are the own­ers of these young men. You all are ter­ri­fied to in­ter­act and speak to them, so now all of a sud­den they must be good cit­i­zens. We need to be brave and sit and talk, not to them, but the peo­ple who are in con­trol of them ...the po­lice need to sit and talk to the Mus­lim (gangs) and the men who are in charge.”

He said the drug and gun trade will not stop, as we con­tin­ue to do the same things ex­pect­ing a dif­fer­ent re­sult.

“The drugs will con­tin­ue to en­ter our coun­try and we need to dis­cuss how it would not de­stroy our peo­ple.”

If the war on crime is not dealt with, Mail­lard warned the sit­u­a­tion will wors­en, as dis­en­fran­chised com­mu­ni­ties have been left be­hind by politi­cians who have mon­ey.

“The pow­er lies with men who pay for things to hap­pen. The pop­u­la­tion has no pow­er. The peo­ple with the mon­ey who makes the rules...and these peo­ple are rep­re­sent­ed by the politi­cians.”

Mail­lard said whether King’s shoot­ers re­turn to fin­ish him off was not the is­sue now.

“I have known Dwayne a long time. His life is not of val­ue to him. How Dwayne lives and how he dies is what is of val­ue to him. We have to make it easy for him and his fam­i­ly.”

Asked if oth­er Mus­lim broth­ers will now be at­tacked, Mail­lard said a Mus­lim is one who sub­mits to the will of Al­lah.

“Then these things re­al­ly don’t mat­ter,” he said, adding the men in­volved in the Mus­lim gang had per­vert­ed Is­lam.

Mail­lard plead­ed with those fu­elling the war in Co­corite to fear their sins and not their en­e­mies.

“There are many en­e­mies to Mus­lims and to Is­lam. They un­der­stand this. The ques­tion is will they do it. The fight is be­tween the Dev­il and your­self.”