Arima, without strong opposition, you get weak government, thats why PNM got away so long. I don't always agree with Rowley, but its his job to voice the peoples opposition to certain policies. It doesn't mean he would do different or has all the answers. Governments need to be held to account and thats the job of the opposition. He may well support the SOE, but judging by some comments here, not everyone feels its necessary.
9/11 was extreme, an act of terrorism and therefore a SOE was justifyable. 11 murders in 3 days is hardly an emergency. Especially when you consider that 7 happened in 2 incidents. Its like saying close down the highways coz you had 2 bad accidents in a weekend.
Maybe I'm being blase, but these murders did not shock too many people. I have no idea what the soloution is, but better policing is required. This is not a big country. T&T is the size of an average US city. London has 6 times as many people. It cannot be that difficult to clamp down. London had around 130 murders in 2009, with a population over 7 million. New York had 466 in 2009 in a population over 8 million.
In the 21st century, T&T rates the worlds sixth highest murder rate with 43 murders per 100,000, compared to UK with 1.58.
Of course, the proximity to the South American drug trade and the US markets don't help, but then, London is pretty close to Europes drug capital, Holland and is a transit point for shipments from Pakistan, Afghanistan & Turkey.
As I've said, I'm not sure what the answer is, but outside help is needed. This island cannot be that difficult to police. Maybe the army should be tasked for anti gang activities?
After 9/11, I read that a think tank was created made up of movie directors, thriller writers like Tom Clancy (who actually wrote a book about terrorists crashing a plane into the Capitol before 9/11). The idea is that fiction is actually likely to become fact. Criminals think outside of the box, and therefore the authorities are often caught out. This think tank are given certain situations and then asked to devise how terrorists would carry through their plans. This is then passed to law enforcement agencies who would then investigate the credibility of these scenarios.
Maybe the police here are too many steps behind the gangs. Maybe Clancy and friends should come to Trini and help us out?