SHAL­IZA HAS­SANALI

Bloody gang ri­val­ry and brazen killings have now tak­en over parts of Tu­na­puna as many un­em­ployed young men find it eas­i­er to ac­cess firearms for as lit­tle as $500 to com­mit crimes.

The eas­i­est way to earn a dol­lar for some of the young men is by rob­bing some­one, even if it means end­ing a life in the process.

The claim: That they are faced with no oth­er op­tion as they face in­creas­ing un­em­ploy­ment and a lack of op­por­tu­ni­ties in the area. Res­i­dents blame un­em­ploy­ment, lack of lead­er­ship, and the ab­sence of sport­ing clubs for the cur­rent crime sit­u­a­tion.

Of the law-abid­ing fam­i­lies in the com­mu­ni­ty, many are fac­ing bor­der­line pover­ty. They have no form of in­come and are un­cer­tain where their next meal will come from.

The po­lice ad­mit­ted that “Tu­na­puna is hot,” es­pe­cial­ly up­per Fair­ley Street, Main­got Road and First and Sec­ond Traces. Once re­gard­ed as close-knit ar­eas, they are now crime hotspots.

“I know we have a lot of work on our hands,” a se­nior of­fi­cer told the Sun­day Guardian.

But the of­fi­cer dis­put­ed that un­em­ploy­ment was fu­elling the crime and mur­ders.

“It’s not un­em­ploy­ment. It is greed. If you com­mit rob­beries, sell drugs and ex­tort mon­ey from peo­ple...that in it­self to them is em­ploy­ment. They are in­volved in crim­i­nal ac­tiv­i­ty.”

He said the gangs are in the habit of shoot­ing at each oth­er for con­trol of “cer­tain blocks and zones”, and this has left res­i­dents liv­ing on the edge.

The re­al­i­ty for Tu­na­puna res­i­dent and moth­er of three Janet Govia (not her re­al name) is grim. Govia, who was too ashamed to give her re­al name, has been sur­viv­ing on a mea­gre month­ly $600 wid­ow’s ben­e­fit.

Govia is one of the scores of un­em­ployed res­i­dents in Tu­na­puna which has a vot­ing pop­u­la­tion of over 25,000. Sand­wiched be­tween St Au­gus­tine and El Do­ra­do, Tu­na­puna has been a Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) strong­hold for sev­er­al years.

Frus­trat­ed, Govia, 36, sat in the liv­ing room of her Fair­ley Street home on Tues­day, as she wait­ed pa­tient­ly for her chil­dren to come home from school.

Pac­ing the floor, Govia said her “chil­dren would be an­noyed be­cause they com­ing home to an emp­ty pot”. She said “They leave home this morn­ing with noth­ing in their stom­achs, and this evening it’s back to square one.”

Govia said she sent the boys to school hop­ing they would be pro­vid­ed with a box lunch.

“It’s the hard­est thing a moth­er could face...to watch your chil­dren starve and not know where the next meal would come from. With ris­ing food in­fla­tion $600 is noth­ing. I can on­ly buy the bare ne­ces­si­ties which run out in a mat­ter of days.”

Her boys–ages six, eight, and nine–have to walk more than a mile to get to school as she can­not af­ford pub­lic trans­port.

Govia be­gan col­lect­ing the so­cial grant from the Gov­ern­ment af­ter her hus­band passed away more than five years ago. She sup­ple­ment­ed the grant by work­ing in a com­pa­ny as a clean­er for two years. But when COVID-19 struck in 2020 she was thrown on the bread­line.

Try­ing to cope with her con­stant strug­gles, Govia said the sit­u­a­tion has been made worse as she al­so has to deal with the war­ring gangs, mur­ders, and blood­shed in the area.

Govia said peo­ple in the com­mu­ni­ty avoid speak­ing about the killings and their hard­ships.

“In the back here peo­ple catch­ing their tails but they would not tell you about it. They have a lot of pride.”

Des­per­ate to move out of the home she grew up in, Govia does not have an al­ter­na­tive and fears her sons might be roped in­to the wrong com­pa­ny, as the gangs are al­ways on a re­cruit­ment dri­ve for young blood.

“It’s a fear I live with. I try to talk to my boys every day. Tell them ed­u­ca­tion is the key to a bet­ter life. De­spite my preach­ing, they can be eas­i­ly in­flu­enced.”

Govia said she has seen good boys in the com­mu­ni­ty go down the wrong path.

“Some of them have died in a hail of gun­fire,” she added.

The woman is con­vinced that un­em­ploy­ment is one of the fac­tors fu­elling gangs and gang ri­val­ry which has in­vad­ed her once peace­ful com­mu­ni­ty.

“There are no jobs for the peo­ple. Se­cur­ing a work hard these rounds…em­ploy­ers ask­ing for ex­pe­ri­ence and qual­i­fi­ca­tions,” Govia said.

Many of the youths, she said, nev­er grad­u­at­ed from sec­ondary school nor have they learned a trade or skill.

“These fel­las have noth­ing to do. They telling you plain if they can’t get work it is eas­i­er to pick up a gun and rob some­body.”

Ac­cord­ing to the most re­cent fig­ures pub­lished by the Cen­tral Sta­tis­ti­cal Of­fice in the sec­ond quar­ter of 2021, there were a to­tal of 28,200 un­em­ployed peo­ple in T&T.

Of this fig­ure 22,600 was ac­tive­ly seek­ing em­ploy­ment. The youth un­em­ploy­ment rate at that time was 12.8 per cent.

The In­ter­na­tion­al Labour Or­gan­i­sa­tion(ILO) stat­ed that youth un­em­ploy­ment had wors­ened by the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic.

Three mur­ders hours apart

The killings of three men in Tu­na­puna just over a week ago pushed the coun­try’s mur­der toll, al­ready past 400, even high­er. This has on­ly added to Govia’s un­ease.

On Au­gust 30, 20-year-old Kester Warn­er was gunned down in a car wash along St Vin­cent Street in Tu­na­puna. Hours lat­er, 50-year-old Richard “Wal­ly” Dray­ton was shot mul­ti­ple times near Church on the Way, Tu­na­puna Road. The fol­low­ing day, gun­men shot and killed 50-year-old Ker­win Warn­er (Kester Warn­er’s fa­ther) in­side Bar­ney’s Va­ri­ety Store, East­ern Main Road, Tu­na­puna. The brazen killing took place a stone’s throw away from the Tu­na­puna Po­lice Sta­tion.

Around the same time as the triple killings, po­lice al­so had to re­spond to a re­port in­volv­ing 56-year-old John­son Ram­loie, who was shot in his el­bow and back near the Monte Grande recre­ation­al ground.

This year, Corey Ben­jamin, Joshua Nicholas Le Plat­te, Shaz­im Habidoon­deen and 15-year-old An­to­nia Bade­noch al­so died of gun­shot wounds in the area.

A po­lice source said that the re­cent mur­ders in Tu­na­puna were all gang-re­lat­ed.

Con­cern­ing one of the mur­ders, the po­lice said, in­for­ma­tion reach­ing them was that a re­put­ed gang leader in the com­mu­ni­ty was paid $100,000 to avenge Kester Warn­er’s mur­der. Warn­er, the po­lice said, was known to the po­lice and had been in­volved in il­le­gal ac­tiv­i­ties.

In 2020, the Sun­day Guardian re­port­ed on a spate of killings in Tu­na­puna that had res­i­dents gripped in fear.

Liv­ing in the “Zone” all her life, Jes­si­ca John­son (not her re­al name) al­so at­trib­uted job­less­ness and a fight for turf as the rea­son for sense­less killings.

Search­ing for a per­ma­nent job be­fore the pan­dem­ic, John­son has not been suc­cess­ful.

She earns $400 a week do­ing jan­i­to­r­i­al work, stat­ing the mon­ey is bare­ly enough to put food on the ta­ble and pay her bills.

The Zone is on the north­ern side of Tu­na­puna.

John­son, who lives alone, ad­mit­ted that boys as young as 14 are al­ready school dropouts and in­volved in gang ac­tiv­i­ty.

“Par­ents can’t con­trol their chil­dren. I watch many of these chil­dren grow up on the block and turn to a life of crime,” she said.

It was cus­tom­ary for John­son to see armed men run­ning and fir­ing shots at one an­oth­er in front of her home.

Long ago, she said, the youths got in­volved in sport­ing and recre­ation­al ac­tiv­i­ties.

“Now their way of ex­er­cis­ing is pick­ing up a gun and shoot­ing af­ter some­one.”

Like Govia, she too wants to flee from the mur­ders and may­hem.

“But go where? I can’t sell my house be­cause no­body would buy my place know­ing what is tak­ing place up here. The area has a rep­u­ta­tion. So, I have to stay and take the grind.”

Rapid gun­fire day and night

Fear­ing for his life, an el­der­ly res­i­dent of Sesame Street, who asked that his name be with­held, said the gangs start­ed with one fam­i­ly and grew with­in the Zone.

“It’s so strange that the youths are con­stant­ly fight­ing with one an­oth­er but their par­ents live in one love.”

He said it was nor­mal to hear rapid gun­fire day and night.

“The po­lice does (sic) pass but that won’t stop them from shoot­ing. A lot of peo­ple move out of the Zone in the last few months be­cause they could not cope with the on­go­ing crime. Oth­ers re­lo­cat­ed and mi­grat­ed af­ter their fam­i­ly mem­bers were gunned down.”

Those who left cre­at­ed a brain drain in the con­stituen­cy.

Hav­ing lived in the com­mu­ni­ty for decades, he said cer­tain ar­eas in Tu­na­puna are now run by gang mem­bers whom he de­scribed as teenage thugs.

“Their lead­ers are un­der the age of 25.”

He said if the gang mem­bers live to their 20th birth­day they would open­ly boast and cel­e­brate. “You would hear them say­ing, I re­al (sic) live, boy. That is an ac­com­plish­ment for them. It’s a badge of ho­n­our.”

The se­nior cit­i­zen called on Tu­na­puna MP Es­mond Forde for bet­ter rep­re­sen­ta­tion.

“When you look around is on­ly one set of peo­ple get­ting con­tracts. Noth­ing trick­les down to the young peo­ple who want bet­ter­ment. Is on­ly one set of peo­ple eat­ing ah food.”

Ad­mit­ting that Tu­na­puna was once a close-knit com­mu­ni­ty, the res­i­dent said the con­stituen­cy has now turned in­to a hell hole with crim­i­nal el­e­ments.

“Tu­na­puna is now a place of ter­ror. Them fel­las...it’s all about pow­er...the pow­er to hold a gun and to con­trol the streets. They don’t care if you are col­lat­er­al dam­age when they start fir­ing on their en­e­mies.”

Gangs named Rebel 6 and 9

From Au­zonville Road to Balt­haz­ar Street, a res­i­dent of the Zone said, three ac­tive gangs of­ten war with each oth­er over turf and drugs.

The gangs have names such as Rebel 6 and 9.

“Each mem­ber is iden­ti­fied by a num­ber. They don’t use names. To me, they are on dotish­ness be­cause none of them is a mil­lion­aire. They have no­body to lead them with sense. All they could do with the lit­tle mon­ey they have is to buy an il­le­gal gun and when they buy the gun they are bro­ken the next morn­ing.”

If they can’t af­ford a gun, he said, one would be rent­ed to car­ry out their il­le­gal acts.

A few months ago, the man said, it was sur­pris­ing to see mem­bers of dif­fer­ent gangs put down their guns and par­tic­i­pate in a friend­ly foot­ball match.

Sit­ting on the steps of his Con­nell Street home, for­mer T&T’s na­tion­al mid­field­er Neil “Brain” Cae­sar, 69, con­fessed that he bare­ly scrapes through the month with his $3,500 se­nior cit­i­zen pen­sion and week­ly foot­ball class­es he of­fers.

Cae­sar, who last worked as a coach for St George’s Col­lege ten years ago, said that un­em­ploy­ment was one of the fac­tors fu­elling crime.

“Tu­na­puna is not dy­ing. It is dead. It has noth­ing to of­fer.”

In all his years, Cae­sar said, this was the worst he has seen.

“This vil­lage was deeply root­ed in sports, now it is a haven for crime in the Zone. It’s sad. Every­body wants to con­trol the block. Thank the Lord I still get­ting a lit­tle pen­sion.”

He said plen­ty of peo­ple in Tu­na­puna have noth­ing to eat and are fac­ing pover­ty.

Nakhid: I’m meet­ing and talk­ing with the youth

De­feat­ed Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress can­di­date David Nakhid ad­mit­ted that like any oth­er con­stituen­cy, Tu­na­puna has an un­em­ploy­ment prob­lem.

Dozens of men be­tween the ages of 16 to 30 would come to UNC’s of­fice in Tu­na­puna week­ly seek­ing jobs.

“Every day I would re­ceive What­sApp mes­sages from con­stituents beg­ging to help them find a job. It shows the lev­el of des­per­a­tion peo­ple are in.” The UNC sen­a­tor said he does not have the re­sources or pow­er to hire peo­ple. “We are not in Gov­ern­ment,” he point­ed out. Nakhid con­test­ed the Tu­na­puna seat in the 2020 gen­er­al elec­tion but Forde won.

Fol­low­ing the PNM’s clo­sure of some Na­tion­al En­er­gy Skills cam­pus­es and MIC cen­tres, and with jobs dwin­dling in the area, Nakhid said he had pre­dict­ed that crime in Tu­na­puna would have surged.

“A lot of men­tor­ships, de­vel­op­men­tal and train­ing pro­grammes that were avail­able have been shut down. Ac­cess to a gun is now eas­i­er than ac­cess to a job or hon­ing a skill. The youths are say­ing they have noth­ing....no hope...no fu­ture...no noth­ing. When you hun­gry and starv­ing and you say, ‘sen­a­tor, I go­ing to look for it,’ I un­der­stand what they mean.”

The most Nakhid said he can do is dis­suade them.

Nakhid said talk on the ground was that the young men have been rent­ing guns for $500, $1,000, and $2,000 to com­mit crimes.

“How are these guns reach­ing their hands? They don’t have a pot to pee in or mon­ey to buy a pack of crix. How are they get­ting the guns? Who are their sup­pli­ers? Where are the guns com­ing from?”

In May, Nakhid be­gan serv­ing 100 break­fast meals at the Tu­na­puna Mar­ket to help feed the peo­ple. Al­so, every Sat­ur­day he dis­trib­uted soup bowls. Nakhid spent $2,000 each day to pro­vide the meals.

The food pro­gramme was on­ly sus­tained for two months, how­ev­er, due to a lack of fund­ing.

He al­so dis­trib­uted 80 ham­pers every month to needy fam­i­lies in the con­stituen­cy.

“When it be­came known about the ham­pers the of­fice sec­re­tary had to re­ject at least 250 peo­ple every two weeks un­til it reached the point that I could no longer give out those ham­pers from the of­fice. I had to de­liv­er them to the homes of the re­cip­i­ents.”

While de­liv­er­ing two large ham­pers to a des­ti­tute fam­i­ly six weeks ago, Nakhid said the de­liv­ery dri­ver was held up and robbed of the gro­cery items.

Nakhid said he spent over $150,000 from his pock­et while spon­sors of­fered $250,000 in the last two years to help those who are less for­tu­nate in the dis­trict.

He said Tu­na­puna needs an in­dus­try to help the peo­ple out of pover­ty. “Any­thing else is a pie in the sky.”

Be­tween last year and this year, Nakhid said he held three meet­ings with some of the trou­bled youth.

No word from Forde

The Sun­day Guardian called Forde’s cell phone sev­en times last week but all calls went unan­swered. He al­so did not re­spond to What­sApp and voice mes­sages.

On Thurs­day, PNM’s PRO Lau­rel Leza­ma-Lee Sing said that Forde was abroad and could not say if he had re­turned. She promised to reach out to Forde to con­tact this re­porter.

How­ev­er, up to the time of this pub­li­ca­tion, Forde had not con­tact­ed us.