Boodhu: Government becoming a ‘government by threat’

PNM Deputy Po­lit­i­cal Leader San­jiv Bood­hu has ac­cused the Gov­ern­ment of be­com­ing a “gov­ern­ment by threat”, ar­gu­ing that its ap­proach to dis­ci­pline, crime and the econ­o­my is plac­ing in­creas­ing pres­sure on cit­i­zens while weak­en­ing the sup­port sys­tems avail­able to fam­i­lies.

Bood­hu was re­spond­ing on so­cial me­dia to Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s call for teach­ers to send dis­rup­tive stu­dents home for their par­ents to deal with.

“Dis­ci­pline is nec­es­sary. Teach­ers must be pro­tect­ed, par­ents must take re­spon­si­bil­i­ty, and stu­dents must un­der­stand that ac­tions have con­se­quences,” Bood­hu said.

How­ev­er, he ques­tioned what awaits stu­dents when they are sent home, point­ing to fam­i­lies deal­ing with un­em­ploy­ment, de­lays in re­ceiv­ing book grants and un­cer­tain­ty sur­round­ing youth in­ter­ven­tion pro­grammes.

He ac­cused the Gov­ern­ment of plac­ing pres­sure on cit­i­zens through what he de­scribed as in­creased tax­es, fines and fees, while re­duc­ing em­ploy­ment op­por­tu­ni­ties and so­cial sup­port.

“This is be­com­ing a gov­ern­ment by threat,” Bood­hu said.

He ar­gued that the ap­proach ex­tends be­yond schools, say­ing work­ers are be­ing threat­ened with dis­missal, mo­torists with fines, small busi­ness­es with ad­di­tion­al costs and cit­i­zens with ex­tra­or­di­nary pow­ers.

Bood­hu al­so crit­i­cised the Gov­ern­ment’s con­tin­ued use of states of emer­gency, ar­gu­ing that pro­longed emer­gency rule can­not re­place polic­ing, so­cial in­ter­ven­tion and eco­nom­ic op­por­tu­ni­ty.

“Af­ter more than a year spent large­ly un­der states of emer­gency, crime still stalks our com­mu­ni­ties,” he said.

Bood­hu said the is­sues fac­ing the coun­try should not be viewed through a po­lit­i­cal lens, ar­gu­ing that un­em­ploy­ment, crime and eco­nom­ic hard­ship af­fect cit­i­zens re­gard­less of their po­lit­i­cal af­fil­i­a­tion.

“Trinidad and To­ba­go can­not be gov­erned through fear, ex­clu­sion and bad­johnism,” he said.

“A gov­ern­ment that re­moves op­por­tu­ni­ty and then pun­ish­es de­spair is not solv­ing the cri­sis. It is man­u­fac­tur­ing the con­di­tions for the next one.”