PM: PNM trying to protect ‘drug mafia friends’

AKASH SAMA­ROO

Se­nior Re­porter

Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar has ac­cused the Op­po­si­tion PNM of stand­ing in the way of ef­forts to dis­man­tle the coun­try’s drug trade, claim­ing the par­ty’s re­sis­tance to 30 pro­posed joint po­lice and army posts is pro­tect­ing what she de­scribed as its “lo­cal drug mafia friends.”

Per­sad-Bisses­sar was re­spond­ing to con­cerns raised by Op­po­si­tion Leader Pen­ne­lope Beck­les over the ini­tia­tive, which the Gov­ern­ment in­tends to roll out over the next four months. Ques­tion­ing the PNM’s op­po­si­tion to the plan, the Prime Min­is­ter ac­cused the par­ty of be­ing more con­cerned about the es­tab­lish­ment of the se­cu­ri­ty posts than what she de­scribed as “drug blocks” op­er­at­ing in com­mu­ni­ties across the coun­try.

“To my ad­mir­ers in the PNM, why com­plain about the 30 new joint army/po­lice posts across the coun­try when you should be com­plain­ing about the drug blocks that your lo­cal drug mafia friends are run­ning across the coun­try, poi­son­ing our chil­dren?” Per­sad-Bisses­sar said.

She claimed PNM strong­hold con­stituen­cies have some of the coun­try’s high­est mur­der rates and con­cen­tra­tions of vi­o­lent gangs, while al­so suf­fer­ing from high un­em­ploy­ment, poor in­fra­struc­ture and lim­it­ed op­por­tu­ni­ties. De­spite those chal­lenges, Per­sad-Bisses­sar al­leged that the Op­po­si­tion and peo­ple she de­scribed as “spokesper­sons for the lo­cal drug mafia” were re­sist­ing an in­creased se­cu­ri­ty pres­ence in those com­mu­ni­ties.

“They are against the joint army/po­lice posts, against Amer­i­can se­cu­ri­ty as­sis­tance, they spread ha­tred against the se­cu­ri­ty ser­vices, and they do and say every­thing to al­low the lo­cal drug mafia to de­stroy PNM strong­holds with il­le­gal drugs and vi­o­lence,” she charged.

The Prime Min­is­ter went fur­ther, ac­cus­ing the for­mer PNM ad­min­is­tra­tion of fail­ing to pro­tect cit­i­zens dur­ing its decade in of­fice. She claimed that 5,000 peo­ple were mur­dered and 8,000 raped dur­ing the PNM’s tenure and al­leged the par­ty had pri­ori­tised the in­ter­ests of wealthy peo­ple she de­scribed as “drug-traf­fick­ing fi­nanciers.”

Per­sad-Bisses­sar pro­vid­ed no ev­i­dence in her state­ment to sub­stan­ti­ate her claims of links be­tween the PNM and drug traf­fick­ers.

The Prime Min­is­ter al­so ac­cused PNM MPs and sup­port­ers of al­low­ing po­lit­i­cal and racial di­vi­sions to in­flu­ence their re­sponse to the Gov­ern­ment’s crime-fight­ing ini­tia­tives. Us­ing a racial slur tra­di­tion­al­ly di­rect­ed at peo­ple of East In­di­an de­scent to re­fer to her­self, Per­sad-Bisses­sar claimed some Op­po­si­tion sup­port­ers would rather see their com­mu­ni­ties con­tin­ue to suf­fer than co­op­er­ate with her ad­min­is­tra­tion and the pro­tec­tive ser­vices.

“Sad­ly, PNM MPs and sup­port­ers are so full of ha­tred and racism that they would pre­fer their strong­hold con­stituen­cies and their chil­dren’s fu­ture to con­tin­ue to be de­stroyed by the lo­cal drug mafia rather than co­op­er­ate with the se­cu­ri­ty ser­vices and the ‘coolie’ Prime Min­is­ter to bring safe­ty to their own con­stituen­cies,” she said.

The Gov­ern­ment has said the 30 joint po­lice-army posts form part of its strat­e­gy to in­crease the pres­ence of the pro­tec­tive ser­vices in com­mu­ni­ties and com­bat se­ri­ous crime.