UNC: Media downplaying crime in TT

THE OPPOSITION United National Congress (UNC) yesterday alleged that the media is siding with the Government to “play down the reporting of crime and criminal activities now plaguing the country.” In a statement, the UNC said: “Since PNM Crime Committee Chairman Ken Gordon met with media bosses last month, crime and criminal activities were taken off the front pages of the newspapers. The media no longer provide information to the public on the number of murders and kidnappings committed. This is creating a false sense of security which seems to have influenced Prime Minister Patrick Manning in making the foolish statement that Trinidad and Tobago is a safe place and that the average citizen feels safe.”

However the UNC claimed that this “Government-influenced censorship of the news has not kept the spate of murders and kidnappings down” and just as Opposition Leader Basdeo Panday predicted, “The murder rate will cross the 200 figure by year’s end. “We are reliably informed that within a 72-hour period last week, there were 30 attempted kidnappings. Our information is that the murder rate now stands at 163, just nine short of last year’s total of 172,” the party declared. The UNC added that the media’s silence on crime is “yet another attempt by the media to be soft on the PNM Government and being part of the Government’s PR machinery. “The media must be free and unfettered. It must continue to hold the PNM Government to scrutiny, just as it did when the UNC was in office. The media must cease to be the cheerleader and choir-boy of the PNM,” the UNC said. Meanwhile, Opposition Chief Whip Ganga Singh described a threatening TSTT text message over the weekend as a “breach of national security” and an act of “cyber terrorism.” He called upon the Government to bring in US and British counter-terrorism experts to help police “bring this matter to a speedy resolution.”