Taking down the cowboys!

January 04, 2003

The concerned brothers on the block are saying: "... if you are the Commissioner of Police, how come there are people out here 'badder' than you...?"

That sounds crude enough but here in lies the logic: the Police Service, Army etc make up the coercive arm of state power, and are the only legitimate organisation authorised to use force or legal violence, so to speak, to maintain law, order and stability.

Then if this is so, how can the head honcho of the Police seem to be cowed by illegitimate cowboys in the street?

How can the Commissioner and even the politicians in Government allow themselves to appear ineffective and as though overwhelmed by the cowboys who seem to taunt the supposed power of the State?

True to say, these cowboys are people who love the limelight, who as they say love to "bling" and be given "a bligh", and in another country, such as Argentina or Chile, they would simply be made to "disappear".

Painful as it may be now, with policemen being murdered and little girls being shot in the head, we have no choice but to look deeper for holistic solutions to the problem of violence and crime.

Crimes of passion and drug-related crimes comprise the largest percentage of all violent crime.

To minimise crimes of passion, society requires a reconstituting of the education process and the creating of a new environment in which male and female members can "re-negotiate" the basis of their fundamental sex relations and their sexual relationships.

The drug-related crimes, however, need a more direct attack.

The only trade that is truly and genuinely "globalised" is the drug trade.

If multinational corporations serve to internationalise a professional middle-class, managerial stratum of varied expertise and technical labour, then the drug trade internationalises corrupt State officials, bankers, and people at every station of life, down to the "mules" and the "cowboys" into a most sophisticated, multi-class network of murder and graft.

The only solution to the globalised drug trade, that accrues some US$300 billion annually, is to remove the "intrinsic value" attached to the drugs.

Drugs must cease to be a commodity. That spells legalisation. Which in turn shall serve to remove their attractiveness to exponents of the sub-culture.

When I was about six years old, there was Ram Shop in Monte Grande, Tunapuna, where "marijuana" was sold. It interested no one except a few old Indian pundits.

The drug trade of today multiplies the amount of cowboys and petty criminals whose internecine warfare for control of turf tends to bring crime to our doorsteps.

Modern weapons are available to them and their connections with certain fat-cat bureaucrats and corrupt officials give them the confidence to terrorise communities and to even take on the police.

There are "Cowboy dons" controlling posses of armed youths throughout Laventille and Morvant and other parts of the East/West Corridor. They boast about their power and their control.

These dons pose as community leaders to cover their illegal activities. They are the ones who provide or rent guns and ammunition to bandits.

No business is spared the ravages of these elements. Law-abiding citizens feel powerless.

People in the communities know who are the real community leaders, the bandits and the dons. They know the women who do everything possible to protect bandits supposedly out of "love" but moreso "greed" since they share in and enjoy the "spoils".

The real community leaders must be empowered to act in concert with the honest police officers to stamp out criminal operators.

Unlike Basdeo Panday's UNC, which gave up on the problem, the PNM is the only party with the machinery to help fight crime at community level.

The machinery must be brought alive permanently, not only during elections, to help in the process.

Empower the party groups and the youth groups financially and otherwise to work to mobilise communities and awake them to collective action to reclaim control from the dons.

In addition, conscript the unemployeds and so-called bad-boys into para-military organisations under the control of the Army and make real soldiers and skilled technicians out of them. In that process, the power of the gun can be demystified.

Lastly, because US deportees have become a significant percentage of the bandit group, the Shiprider Agreement signed by Ramesh Lawrence Maharaj then of the UNC must be reviewed.

One recalls Ramesh noting that "sovereignty was a concept of the past". That was, and still is, utter nonsense!

The USA must be made to accept the responsibility for rehabilitating people who grew up in that country. And each particular case must be treated on its own merit. They must be told that we are not prepared to accept deportees carte-blanche and for those whom we accept all relevant information and rap-sheet have to be provided.