BRIDGETOWN, Barbados, Sept 22, CMC – Opposition Leader Ralph Thorne says the Democratic Labour Party (DLP) will not be accepting Prime Minister Mia Mottley’s invitation to sit on a National Advisory Council on Citizen Security announced as one of the government’s crime fighting strategies following a surge in shootings, several of them fatal.
Last Thursday, Mottley told the country the council would be immediately tasked with providing a comprehensive approach to combating crime and restoring stability. Its creation came on the heels of a mass shooting at a bar in the capital, in which three people were killed and eight others injured.
The council – chaired by former Senator Professor Velma Newton and comprised of representatives from the trade union movement, religious organisations, communications, the private sector, the legal fraternity, and other interested groups – had their first meeting the next day.
The Leader of the Opposition or his representative was among the people identified by the prime minister as members of the council.
But a briefing on Saturday, Thorne said that after consulting with the party’s Executive Council, a decision was taken to decline the invitation, primarily because of the absence of critical voices on the council which raised the DLP’s doubts about the ability of the body to be effective.
“On matters of security, apparently the Commissioner of Police will not be present. The head of the BDF [Barbados Defence Force] will not be present. Several of the government’s social agencies, certainly the Probation Department, will not be present,” he pointed out.
“So, while we are not questioning the competencies of those who sit on the council, we are questioning the conspicuous absences of critical persons whose jobs bring them into contact with the question of national and citizen security.”
DLP spokesperson on crime, Verla De Peiza, also raised doubts about the council’s ability to make a meaningful impact without a long-term strategy.
She said the party’s Commission on Crime, which she chairs, is “well advanced” in its work and will shortly be providing its report.
“Our research is almost complete,” she said. “All of the research that we have unearthed so far has pointed us in the direction of prevention – directing people away from criminal activity by way of social engineering, and this was curiously absent from any of the discussion,” she said.
De Peiza said the party was prepared to share the research with the government to foster a broader discussion on crime prevention.
“We have no difficulty at all because this is a national discussion,” she said. “We’re sharing our research once concluded and sharing our findings and proposals once concluded.”
CMC/ed/24