Release from NTA
With nothing of significance to speak about for the 8 years that Keith Rowley has been in office, and with Local Government Elections less than a month away, it seems the PNM’s social media attack team has resorted to the only tactic they have left, which is to attempt to muddy the waters with fear-mongering, misinformation, and outright lies. They are once again trying to attack the record of Political Leader of the NTA, Gary Griffith, and give credit to Covid and lockdowns, for the success seen during his tenure.
It is, for this reason, we are compelled to remind the public of the following:
*Gary Griffith is the most successful Commissioner of Police in decades, as he was able to reduce crime across the board by 35%. It’s the lowest in 17 years.
*Public trust and confidence in the TTPS was 14% when he became Commissioner, and it rose to 55% by the time he left.
*In his last full year in office, September 1st 2020 to August 31st 2021, 342 murders were recorded. The lowest in decades.
* For the first 3 months of 2020, there were no public health restrictions, no State of Emergency and no curfew, yet still we had the safest carnival on record, and the reduction in crime and murders had begun.
* In October and November of 2021, after Griffith left, our country experienced its 3rd highest and most murder filled months in its history, and we had public health restrictions, a State of Emergency, and a curfew.
* During the pandemic, many states across the USA had massive increases in crime. This means that those locally who continue to make the false argument that the pandemic was responsible for our record reductions in crime, are wrong, and the criminals in the USA missed the memo that they shouldn’t commit crime during the period.
*After the pandemic, both Guyana and Jamaica saw reductions in crime and murder, as once again criminals in our region missed the memo that crime is supposed to increase after Covid. In contrast Trinidad and Tobago saw such record increases, that in 2022 we tragically crossed 600 murders for the first time in our history, and half-way through 2023, we are set to reach and surpass that 600 mark once again.
* While public health restrictions began in late March 2020, advising nonessential workers to stay home, by May 15th that was lifted, and while other businesses in the private sector were to shut down by 8 PM, there were no enforceable restrictions on the movement of people, which means there was nothing stopping criminals from committing crimes and murders, because the State of Emergency and curfew, was actually put in place on May 15th 2021, almost a year after the public health restrictions for the pandemic began.
In fact, it could be argued that the shut down of businesses, which created economic hardship, would have triggered more criminal activity as a result, and with citizens ‘trapped’ in their homes, one might have expected home invasions to increase to staggering numbers, but not only did this not occur, the explosion in home invasions actually occurred in the past year, after systems put in place by Griffith were shut down.
All old arguments which have been thoroughly refuted, they’ve now added a twist to their campaign of misinformation by suggesting that Griffith ‘wasn’t a real police’ and Griffith ‘wasn’t qualified when he became Commissioner’.
Apart from the fact that when Griffith applied for Commissioner in 2018, he received the highest score of all who applied, some 84% to Erla Christopher’s 54%, when the assessment was done by international experts, who do the same all over the world, and in 2021 he also received the highest score, 94% to Erla Christopher’s 74%; this argument is also an inadvertent endorsement of Griffith.
Because what Griffith brought to the TTPS, and what the majority of the public respects and endorses him for, is LEADERSHIP. Leadership that is surely lacking this past 8 years, and which the public will have a chance to see again, after August 14th.
Tim Teemal
NTA General Secretary
Email: ntaistheway@gmail.com
WhatsApp: 482-Gary [4279] / 483-Gary [4279]