A dastardly act

John and her sister sustained cuts and bruises, plus severe psychological trauma, in seeking to evade the frightening assault.

In the season of goodwill and in the country’s premier green-space, two thugs launched the seemingly premeditated attack on the women, John, a leading citizen who, despite her contentious encounters with politicians and boards, has given years of service to the State.

The attack would raise all kinds of speculation, including notions of a hit, a vendetta and even political involvement.

But what is doubtless is that the two assailants were bent on terrifying their victims and creating confusion using scratch-bombs.

They have instead exposed themselves as spineless cowards. We join all citizens in demanding all energies towards finding these cretins and having them feel the full brunt of the law.

We adopt this position acknowledging that the damage to these women’s peace of mind and the further denting of the Nation’s psyche have already been done. This time it was scratch bombs - the psychological distress and physical hazard already recognised by Cuffie’s, campaign against scratch bombs in the wake of injuries to grandmother, Sally-Ann Cuffie - but it could just as easily have been a more potent device, or indeed, even gunshots. In fact, the victims thought they were being fired upon, with the assailants blurting “shoot, shoot.” Thankfully, John and her sister, emerged relatively unscathed, compared to other victims of violence both here and abroad. Locally, among the 400-plus homicides, we particularly lament the murder of churchgoer, Felicia Dyer Francis, 71, to “send a message” to her policeman son, and of Shannon Banfield, 20, whose demise came as she did the most ordinary of chores - shopping - in the heart of the nation’s capital. Internationally, we mourn the victims - chosen at random as is the want of terrorism – as exemplified in the Berlin truck massacre and similar heinous events in other European capitals and in the United States, and those summarily executed or displaced by the horrors of internecine struggle as evidenced in Aleppo.

While it may seem clich?d and impossibly Utopian, we truly wish for the season’s proverbial “peace on earth, goodwill to man”, both for TT and beyond our shores.

Minister in the Office of the Prime Minister, Stuart Young, recently disclosed the shocking statistic that some 182 nationals of TT are suspected of financing terrorist activities worldwide. These findings in the latest Financial Intelligence Agency (FIU) Report must register sombrely with us all, including the security services, whom we say must remain on top of the situation which indicates persons directly carrying out acts reflective of man’s inhumanity to man or financing others to do so.

At present most violent crimes in TT are committed for pecuniary gain, allowing a certain “method in its madness”. Fortunately, rarer by far are violent acts designed to terrify citizens, such as the scratch bomb attack on John and her sister. Attacks based on vendettas and even on ideology have no place in a society such as Trinidad and Tobago, which we pray will be able to continue to boast of relative peace on its earth and even goodwill to all.