By Raffique Shah
February 07, 2026

The first dire warning I issued on this threat to the stability of the nation was so far back that I hardly recall the date and circumstances on which I had spoken.

It was definitely before the 2025 general election. Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar had triggered the alarm system in my head which raised serious concerns of something close to a race war about to erupt. Sticking with her violent solutions to the runaway crime problem, not for the first time, she simulated a pistol being fired by her hand, with a mischievous look on her face; she squeezed the trigger a few times, shouting empty the clip.

Anyone who saw it saw the totally unnecessary, almost obscene display of animal behaviour. She gave the impression that she was firing the gun until every bullet in its chamber was out of the weapon. The audience at that meeting could see the victims’ blood soak the soil crimson.

The audience in her theatre macabre seemed immersed in both blood and violence. An almost polite applause sounded, the PM took a bow—another zenith in her chequered career as politician and “leader of a gang of people”.

I use “leader of a gang of people” here in the sense that every politician, business magnate, senior public servant, or head of enterprise controls a gang that may or may not be engaging in criminal activities.

Henceforth, any servant, officer or friend of the PM undertaking this now-made-seemingly-simple act will hardly need to develop anything resembling courage. All they need is to say something as stupid as, “The PM say I could shoot you.”

When she took over governance in last April by a majority that was large, the Government enjoyed such popular support, even devotion. The PM got close to ruling by fiat, which she seemed to enjoy.

To illustrate symbolism, a mode that she often resorts to, she could have used speech or a licensed firearm, preferably her own. One of her ancestors, Bhadase Sagan Maraj, often in the midst of making a contribution to a debate in the House, threw his two firearms on the desk after waving them wildly in the chamber. If she did, she could escape sanctions under cover of following the ­leader.

While many may view such behaviour as acceptable, I think it is downright irresponsible. It would not be acceptable in any public building or place anywhere in this country or elsewhere in the world. The PM’s conduct, in my view, was unbecoming of a future leader, or even a past leader, for that matter. I get that we are fed up of crime and especially the home invasions, but that does not give any citizen the right to take the law into his own hands.

What is worse than this is the new stand-your-ground legislation, which has many lawyers and law academics alike split in their interpretation of it and how it measures up to the jurist’s AV Dicey’s Rule of Law.

But these are unimportant to the wider issue of crime and criminality that, whatever to the contrary, the PM, or the Commissioner of Police, or the Minister of Savagery or whatever Alexander’s portfolio is, may say, crime continues to be of grave concern to citizens and visitors alike.

No matter how many times they try to convince the population via charts, data, etc, that crime is on the decline, the ­citizens know otherwise.

Now, no one will deny the PM her infant jollies or toys,—call them what you will. However, they were destined to backfire in the faces of the very people who called on the Government to wage war against criminals, foreign or local.

But when her imagined bullets strike families of the ruling party’s core supporters, they end up crying blood as their loved ones are felled by the very same actions they called for. And, when a people are hurt by such losses, they scream for vengeance; matters not where it comes from.

Today it’s the police who happened to fire their guns at the young man and woman in their vehicle. Tomorrow, it’s somebody’s mother or father innocently driving another popular make of car synonymous with the criminal element. In battles such as these when people are baying for blood, any blood will do, until it turns out to be little Sudesh’s from down the road.

Left unabated, with excuses being made for the perpetrators of the crimes, this gives a deadly degree of power to persons who legally carry firearms. It is the equivalent of giving licences to kill to a bunch of people, many of whom struggled to get five Ordinary Level passes at CXC.

This is not a mess; it’s madness.