RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

A mat­ter filed in the House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives to dis­cuss T&T’s “out­ra­geous crime rate” was yes­ter­day ground­ed by House Speak­er Bridgid An­nisette-George.

The mat­ter was filed by Barataria MP Sad­dam Ho­sein as one of ur­gent pub­lic im­por­tance un­der Stand­ing Or­der 17.

In a state­ment af­ter the mat­ter was ground­ed, Ho­sein said there was an “ur­gent need for the Gov­ern­ment to ac­count to the cit­i­zens af­ter wit­ness­ing over 500 grue­some mur­ders, rob­beries, and ter­ri­fy­ing home in­va­sions.”

He said it was im­por­tant to dis­cuss “the fail­ure of the Gov­ern­ment to take de­ci­sive, ur­gent and crit­i­cal mea­sures to pro­tect our cit­i­zens from the out­ra­geous in­crease in crim­i­nal ac­tiv­i­ties.”

De­spite the im­por­tance of the dis­cus­sion, Ho­sein said he was in­formed by the Par­lia­ment at 12.57 yes­ter­day, via a phone call, that “the Speak­er of the House was not sat­is­fied that this mat­ter of the out­ra­geous crime sit­u­a­tion was not ur­gent, def­i­nite and of pub­lic im­por­tance.”

“As such, the Speak­er did not al­low the mat­ter to be read dur­ing to­day’s (yes­ter­day’s) sit­ting and for a record to be placed on the Hansard,” he added.

Ex­press­ing dis­plea­sure with the de­ci­sion, Ho­sein said: “While young stu­dents are hid­ing un­der their desks in schools from near rapid gun­fire, per­sons be­ing robbed and gunned down in broad day­light, the Gov­ern­ment re­fus­es to dis­cuss the is­sue of crime.”

He added: “To­day (yes­ter­day), we have a Prime Min­is­ter in iso­la­tion, a sleep­ing Min­is­ter of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty and a Gov­ern­ment hid­ing from the elec­torate. It is clear that the Gov­ern­ment has ab­di­cat­ed its re­spon­si­bil­i­ty to pro­tect the cit­i­zens of T&T.”

Ho­sein said the “Gov­ern­ment needs to take de­ci­sive ac­tion to pre­vent crim­i­nals in their pur­suit of mur­ders, rob­beries and home in­va­sions.”

“The Gov­ern­ment has mis­man­aged the var­i­ous arms of na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty which has re­sult­ed in low de­tec­tion and con­vic­tion rates.”

He al­so said the mat­ter of crime is ur­gent be­cause the mur­der toll has crossed over 500 mur­ders for the year.

“If ur­gent steps are not im­ple­ment­ed, it will re­sult in fur­ther killing and ram­pant gang ac­tiv­i­ties,” he added.

Ho­sein ar­gued that the mat­ter was ur­gent as Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley had sum­moned the ex­ec­u­tive of the TTPS to an emer­gency meet­ing on Mon­day to dis­cuss the is­sue of crime.

“The mat­ter is of pub­lic im­por­tance be­cause cit­i­zens are now fear­ful for their lives as there is no im­me­di­ate in­ter­ven­tion tak­en by the Gov­ern­ment,” he said.

He said the dis­turb­ing im­ages of chil­dren of Rose Hill RC hud­dled un­der desks while gun­fire erupts, show that the Gov­ern­ment had lost con­trol of crime.