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PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad (CMC) – Acting Police Commissioner, Stephen Williams, has lamented the crime rate in the twin-island republic, stating that the society is a violent one.
“Trinidad and Tobago has become a very violent society. We express violence for the simplest things. Imagine a man arguing with someone he knows, over a gyro, and it ends in murder,” said Williams, in an interview with the Sunday Newsday newspaper.
Since the start of the year, 17 people have been murdered.
“Counting the murders is painful; we should feel pain when anyone dies,” Williams said.
Acting T&T Police Commissioner, Stephen Williams.
The Acting Police Commissioner revealed that, despite the record high number of gun seizures – 685 guns for 2015 – the murders continued, unabated, and proposed, what he calls “collective efficacy”, where the entire society must come together to deal with crime.
“We must ensure community life, so we don’t see each other as enemies, but as friends,” he said.
“We have to start caring for each other. If we look at the criminal element in TT, it’s a minority, so we have to work together to prevent crime from happening,” he added.
Williams made his comments, as the Opposition had intended to ask the government about plans to tackle crime, when Parliament sat on Monday.
Last Saturday, opposition leader, Kamla Persad-Bissessar, revealed that she was going to take the issue to Parliament.
“I intend to file a question, on Monday, in Parliament, for the Government to tell us their plans; what they intend to do with this spike in crime, especially in the murder rate,” Persad-Bissessar said.
She added, “We have given them suggestions in the past. They keep saying that the population rejected us and, therefore, they do not want to hear our suggestions.”
Raising concerns, once again, about the government’s plans to tackle the issue of the spike in crime, in particular, murders, Persad-Bissessar emphasised, that since the Dr. Keith Rowley-led administration is “now in charge”, they must inform the public about what they intend to do about the issue.
