THE day after the end state of emergency (SoE), which began December 30 and came to an end at midnight on April 13, Newsday took to the streets of Port of Spain seeking opinions from members of the public on the effectiveness of the measure which sought to address a rise in gang-related violence.
“Honestly, the effectiveness is at a point where I completely forgot we even had a SoE,” said Christopher Roxborough.
“I don’t see any kind of effect from it. I think the last thing we heard was that they got some guns a little while ago, but that’s pretty much the most I heard.”
While not opposed to the SoE as a crime-fighting measure, Roxborough said poor execution and lack of proper use of intelligence rendered it ineffective.
“People in the neighbourhood know who is doing what. It not that hard to get the information. Even the officers themselves know who is doing what because some of them are the ones doing the crime.
“So it shouldn’t be that hard if they actually decided to put the work in and do the proper investigation. If they were to actually do something, I think the SoE could actually help the country but they’re not doing anything with the information. It’s just a name at this point.”
On April 16, police announced that more than 4,000 people had been arrested with 1,600 of them being charged during the SoE.
In addition, 50 people were held under the Preventive Detention Order (PDO) provisions of the SoE. Of those, 11 were charged as the SoE ended on April 13 while the remaining 39 were released.
Police said those charged faced serious allegations including being gang members, gun possession, conspiracy to murder and attempted murder.
They have been identified as Thomas Ali, Akim Purcelle, Karrisa Rampaul, Naphtalie Bonnapart, Joshua Mone, Shaquille Pinder, Jarrel Baboolal, Joven Gomes, Shane Benito, Kema Mc Shine and Carlvin Lee.
On April 14, Roxborough added that while a change in leadership could help the crime situation, a greater societal change was also needed.
“People have to look at themselves. Even the citizens have some form of corruption that they may do. For example, you know you’re not supposed to park in a particular spot but you park there anyway because you know you might get away with it.
“Those little things we take for granted. We do it daily and don’t realise that it’s part of this mindset that we have. We boil it down to, ‘That’s how it is, we is trinis.’
“But we need to stop thinking like that and we need to hold ourselves accountable.”
Also speaking to Newsday on April 14, Sean Balfour said he never thought the SoE made any sense in the first place.
“The SoE did nothing. It’s a waste of time, nothing never stop. Killings keep on going the same way, robberies going the same way.”
He called for a change in governance to bring a solution but expressed little hope in the existing or prospective leaders contesting the 2025 general election.
“Everybody just doing the same thing over and over, we don’t need it like that any more. We need somebody sound to really run the country the way it’s supposed to be.
“All my life, all I know is the PNM, but it’s a waste of time. If you have a dog home and it bite you and you love that dog, you know, you’ll forgive it, but I don’t want to see them again, the vision for them is totally gone."
He expressed some confidence in the UNC as he considered “giving them a try” as well as Patriotic Front leader Mickela Panday.
“She learned from the best, she learned from the Silver Fox (her father and former prime minister Basdeo Panday). So she might have a slight chance.”
However, 77-year-old Josephine said better parenting would be the best solution for solving crime, especially in light of rising youth involvement in gang violence.
“If you have a proper upbringing you would not find them kinda thing to do. You would have a base. You will know that you never see your mother, your father or your grandfather doing them thing. It will have the one or two who fall out of that order but that’s the base.
“But now it have children making children so that says it all.”
Josephine also lamented what she saw as a lack of results coming out of the SoE.
“They still have one set of killing all over the place. They still robbing you, they still breaking and entering your place, all kind of thing. It wasn’t effective at all.”
Newsday also posed the question of the SoE's effectiveness to social media users who gave mixed opinions.
One user simply called the SoE "a pappy show" while another said it was, "Yet another unnecessary erosion of the legal rights of the population."
Vall-Lories Lewis offered a different perspective, saying the SoE was somewhat effective in decreasing the murder rate. But as the general crime rate remained high, he said the SoE was not an effective crime-fighting solution.
Michael Gangoo Jr had similar views, saying, "Nothing the police nor the Ministry of National Security do will ever solve crime. It's in the hearts of men to stop crime.”
