Op­po­si­tion Leader Kam­la Per­sad Bisses­sar has re­spond­ed to the de­c­la­ra­tion of a State of Emer­gency in T&T.

The fol­low­ing is her state­ment:

OP­PO­SI­TION LEADER: I called for a state of emer­gency (SOE) in Jan­u­ary 2024, as I cor­rect­ly pre­dict­ed that fail­ure to do so would re­sult in a most mur­der­ous year. I was round­ly con­demned by the Prime min­is­ter and his po­lit­i­cal and busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty sup­port­ers. Many lives could have been saved had they heed­ed my ad­vice at the be­gin­ning of this year. This SOE was not called be­cause of any gen­uine con­cern for the safe­ty of cit­i­zens but rather as a shame­less act of po­lit­i­cal gim­mick­ry to be used as pro­pa­gan­da for the up­com­ing gen­er­al elec­tion. The Prime Min­is­ter could not find the courage to ad­dress the na­tion. This is un­doubt­ed­ly the most in­sult­ing act of cow­ardice and dis­re­spect we have ever wit­nessed from this lazy, greedy old man.

Af­ter lis­ten­ing to a most pa­thet­ic gov­ern­ment press con­fer­ence this morn­ing, it is clear that the SOE was not called be­cause of any gen­uine con­cern for the safe­ty of cit­i­zens but rather as a shame­less act of po­lit­i­cal gim­mick­ry to be used as pro­pa­gan­da for the up­com­ing gen­er­al elec­tion. The Gov­ern­ment is drown­ing in self-made fail­ure and has re­sort­ed again to us­ing the dead cat tac­tic, where­by they make a shock­ing an­nounce­ment to di­vert at­ten­tion away from so­ci­ety’s prob­lems and is­sues. This Gov­ern­ment con­tin­ues to em­bar­rass it­self and has be­come a laugh­ing­stock.

1) Where was the Prime Min­is­ter?

This SOE’s lack of se­ri­ous­ness is ev­i­dent as Row­ley did not find it im­por­tant to at­tend the press con­fer­ence to ad­dress cit­i­zens but chose to golf in To­ba­go and en­joy the 50 mil­lion tax­pay­er dol­lars for fete­ing and rum drink­ing. The Prime Min­is­ter of Trinidad and To­ba­go is the head of the Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Coun­cil, yet he has gone in­to hid­ing. Is he afraid of the very crim­i­nals that have caused so much death and de­struc­tion in our coun­try? How can it be that, with over 625 per­sons mur­dered in 2024, the Prime Min­is­ter could not find the courage to ad­dress the na­tion? This is un­doubt­ed­ly the most in­sult­ing act of cow­ardice and dis­re­spect we have ever wit­nessed from this lazy, greedy old man.

2) Min­is­ters’ Con­tra­dic­tions

Trinidad and To­ba­go has just record­ed the high­est mur­der rate in its his­to­ry. In­stead of show­ing lead­er­ship and ad­dress­ing the na­tion di­rect­ly, Row­ley del­e­gat­ed his re­spon­si­bil­i­ties to the ut­ter­ly in­com­pe­tent Fitzger­ald Hinds and Stu­art Young. The Min­is­ters—wide­ly de­spised as fail­ures—then pro­ceed­ed to give lengthy, ram­bling state­ments of why this mea­sure was im­ple­ment­ed dur­ing the coun­try’s busiest so­cial, eco­nom­ic, and tourism pe­ri­od, just at the be­gin­ning of the Car­ni­val 2025 sea­son.

They con­tra­dict­ed each oth­er re­gard­ing the ra­tio­nale for the SOE. Ac­cord­ing to Hinds, the procla­ma­tion was nec­es­sary due to the crime sta­tis­tics of 2024, while Young con­tra­dict­ed him and in­sist­ed that it was due to the high in­ci­dence of high-cal­i­bre weapons used in mur­ders over the last few days and the an­tic­i­pat­ed reprisals.

3) Gov­ern­ment by Vaps

The very method by which the Row­ley Gov­ern­ment chose to in­form the coun­try of this cru­cial de­ci­sion— which will af­fect all as­pects of our col­lec­tive and in­di­vid­ual lives and our eco­nom­ic ac­tiv­i­ties and prospects— was a tes­ta­ment to their per­pet­u­al, dis­as­trous, con­fused, dis­mis­sive, in­com­pe­tent modus operan­di. The coun­try awoke this morn­ing to a du­bi­ous press re­lease that de­clared an SOE but had no de­tails nor even iden­ti­fi­able of­fi­cial mark­ings, and it was right­ly rapid­ly con­demned as fake news by most peo­ple.

This forced the in­com­pe­tent Min­is­ters of En­er­gy (act­ing At­tor­ney Gen­er­al) and Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty to hasti­ly call a news con­fer­ence to con­vince the coun­try that it was re­al. This re­in­forces the fact that this State of Emer­gency was called by vaps by a clue­less regime that knows it is on the tail end of its decade of de­struc­tive rule over our coun­try on the eve of gen­er­al elec­tions. The coun­try is wait­ing to vote them out of of­fice once and for all.

Their claim that it was called overnight based on in­tel­li­gence about im­pend­ing gang war­fare is sim­ply not con­vinc­ing, giv­en the fact that mul­ti­ple gang mur­ders have plagued this na­tion every sin­gle day in the past year. Their state­ments about high-pow­ered il­le­gal weapon­ry be­ing used are equal­ly un­be­liev­able be­cause, again, this has been the re­al­i­ty for the past al­most ten years.

Pro­claim­ing the SOE was def­i­nite­ly not a mat­ter of care­ful con­sid­er­a­tion or strat­e­gy but was pure­ly a pub­lic re­la­tions stunt.

4) Re­al­i­ty

This is the re­al­i­ty we face: over 20 peo­ple were gunned down in a sin­gle week, 625 for 2024, and Row­ley is nowhere to be found. This is the same Prime Min­is­ter who has presided over a gov­ern­ment that has al­lowed ter­ror to reign in Trinidad and To­ba­go for the past 10 years, where about 4700 peo­ple were mur­dered. Un­der his neg­li­gence since 2015, we have seen un­prece­dent­ed waves of crim­i­nal­i­ty, ram­pant killings, home in­va­sions, and the break­down of law and or­der.

5) The gov­ern­ment has no co­he­sive plan

Let us be clear: this gov­ern­ment has no re­al plan to tack­le crime. We have warned about this for about 10 years, but Row­ley and his ad­min­is­tra­tion have failed to act. With gen­er­al elec­tions loom­ing, the Prime Min­is­ter is again re­sort­ing to a State of Emer­gency as in 2020—a last-ditch, des­per­ate at­tempt at pro­pa­gan­da for Gen­er­al elec­tions.

Why now, just be­fore the elec­tions? Why has the gov­ern­ment on­ly now wok­en up to the in­flux of high-pow­ered weapons flood­ing our streets? Did these weapons mag­i­cal­ly ap­pear yes­ter­day?

The truth is, this is the re­sult of about ten years of fail­ure by the PNM and na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty ap­pa­ra­tus to se­cure our bor­ders, com­bat the traf­fick­ing of guns and drugs, and con­trol the rise of gang ac­tiv­i­ty. This gov­ern­ment has al­lowed these crim­i­nals to grow bold­er and more dan­ger­ous by the day.

6) Shame­less po­lit­i­cal Gim­mick­ry

Let us al­so be clear: I called for a state of emer­gency in Jan­u­ary 2024 as I cor­rect­ly pre­dict­ed that fail­ure to do so would re­sult in a most mur­der­ous year. I was round­ly con­demned by the Prime min­is­ter and his po­lit­i­cal and busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty sup­port­ers. Many lives could have been saved had they heed­ed my ad­vice at the be­gin­ning of this year. His pri­or re­fusals and con­dem­na­tions clear­ly in­di­cate that this SOE is Row­ley’s last, des­per­ate at­tempt to con­vince the pop­u­la­tion that he has a crime plan on the vir­tu­al eve of gen­er­al elec­tions in Trinidad and To­ba­go.

It is noth­ing short of a ‘vikey vie’ pro­pa­gan­da gim­mick, a pub­lic re­la­tions tool for elec­tions pur­pos­es, es­pe­cial­ly since it pre­cedes the Row­ley Gov­ern­ment’s planned To­ba­go re­treat over the week­end—at tax­pay­ers’ ex­pense—to al­leged­ly plan a Par­lia­men­tary agen­da.

This State of Emer­gency is a shame­less po­lit­i­cal gim­mick, a band-aid so­lu­tion in an elec­tion year that does noth­ing to ad­dress the root caus­es of crime. This gov­ern­ment is out of ideas and out of time. Cow­ard Row­ley has no plan and is hid­ing from the vi­o­lent crime cri­sis he and his gov­ern­ment con­tributed to over the last ten years. No plans were giv­en for post-SOE.

7) UNC has a com­pre­hen­sive plan

The on­ly way to bring re­al change and re­store safe­ty to Trinidad and To­ba­go is to vote the UNC in­to gov­ern­ment. A Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) gov­ern­ment has a com­pre­hen­sive, ac­tion­able plan to com­bat crime.

We will not hide. We will not fail. We will act.