Kamla slams PM for runaway crime

IN THE wake of Thursday’s kidnapping of three-year-old Saada Singh — a businessman’s daughter — Siparia MP Kamla Persad-Bissessar is laying blame for the rampant crime situation in the country  squarely on the shoulders of Prime Minister Patrick Manning. Persad-Bissessar came out with her political guns blazing, while addressing a crime symposium organised by the Penal/Debe Chamber of Commerce at Club Pure Energy in SS Erin Road, Debe on Thursday evening. The symposium, entitled “Arresting Crime,” also saw newly promoted ACP (South) Dennis Graham and Snr Supt Anthony Wayne Brooks, addressing the audience. 

Persad-Bissessar, a former attorney general under the UNC administration, said blame should not be placed on the Police Service, since it lacked equipment, manpower and moral leadership to effectively fight crime. “We cannot keep blaming the police when you are not giving them basic physical and human resources. I do not believe and don’t think the majority of citizens believe it is the police to blame with respect to what is happening in the country,” she said. “The Police Service must be given the physical and human resources to fight crime,” Bissessar continued, and she compared the Police Service’s present condition to a person trying to fight crime with both hands tied behind their back. She observed that effective crime fighting was not about the law, but about implementation of the law.

She once again outlined the Opposition UNC’s reluctance to support the proposed Police Reform Bills, saying “tremendous authority” would be placed in the hands of the new Commissioner of Police — a political appointee — who could only be appointed by the Prime Minister. She also called on both Prime Minister Manning (who is also chairman of the National Security Council) and National Security Minister Martin Joseph, to stop sending mixed signals to the Police Service by continuing to meet with so-called “community leaders.”

“You must give them the moral leadership. You cannot one day be shaking hands and meeting these ‘community leaders’ and lifting them up and then expect the police to say ‘I’m going to lock up those criminals who are pretending to be community leaders.’” “You must be tough on crime. You cannot be soft on them one day and the next day the police themselves saying it is confusion,” Bissessar added. Also addressing the symposium was Penal/Debe Chamber president, Leo Doodnath, who said crime had reached “an unacceptable level.” He said last Monday’s total shutdown of businesses in the Penal/Debe area was the business community’s response to the general feeling of helplessness that has descended on the country.