Retired Major General Edmund Dillon said the people of Chatham where four members of one family were recently wiped out continue to live in fear and have become prisoners in their own home.
Dillon, a former chief of defence staff, who is the People’s National Movement (PNM) candidate for Point Fortin, said crime was eating away at the souls of the people and murders had become too commonplace under the present People’s Partnership administration.
At a public meeting at Market Square, Point Fortin, on Wednesday night, Dillon promised to do all he could to bring crime under control once the PNM won the election.
Before an audience which included Opposition Leader Dr Keith Rowley and his predecessor Paula Gopee-Scoon, Dillon said he could no longer sit idly by as he looked at the crime situation in this country.
“The fear of crime is worse than crime itself. The people of Chatham are still living in fear. They are scared,” he added.
He questioned how many knew what the murder rate was at the moment, pointing out that when the late Martin Joseph was minister of national security it was front-page news.
“Now, you can’t even find it (murder rate) in the newspapers. It is almost like it doesn’t exist. In this present government murder has become commonplace.
“They did not pay any attention to it, yet it is the barometer by which we measure the security in any country. We have to do something about it,” he said.
The murder rate stands at 269 compared with 285 for the corresponding period last year. Dillon recalled a time under the Patrick Manning administration, when he was chief of defence staff, they were the leaders in security in the region.
Today, he said, all of the security institutions in the country have been dismantled, referring to the Special Anti-Crime Unit, the Strategic Services Agency, with nothing else to replace them. He said it was the incoming PNM government that would have the task of rebuilding the country’s mechanisms.
‘You know we have been relegated to tier two watch list by the US State Department for trafficking and persons report. Look a the amount of guns and drugs coming into our country at this time... our porous borders.
“I have a pet peeve for Offshore Patrol Vessels (OPV) because I was the Chief of Defence Force when we decided OPV was a requirement for our maritime security.”
Dillon said the OPVs which the Government cancelled and which were a requirement at that time were still a requirement today to safely patrol T&T’s borders.