—hunting Dana Seetahal’s assassins

TRINIDAD AND Tobago’s famous soca star Machel Montano sent tears flowing on Thursday as he paid tribute to the highly reputed and fearless woman attorney of the country’s criminal justice system, Dana Seetahal, who has been assassinated.For their part, the police remain under growing public pressure to find the two hired killers who shot the 58-year-old attorney to death last Saturday night as she was driving to her home in Woodbrooke, on the outskirts of Port-of-Spain.

Guyanese, like Jamaicans, who would also be familiar with recurring execution crimes, may be aware that, in going on the offensive to find Seetahal’s killers, the government in Port-of-Spain is also seeking the cooperation of Interpol and the FBI, in addition to that of member states of the Caribbean Community.

Just a few days ago, the Association of Caribbean Commissioners of Police (ACCP) lamented in a press statement that the murder rates in this Region “are far too high, with some countries recording over 50 homicides per 100,000 population”. Further, that “corruption is now endemic at over 60 percent” in the Region, according to a ‘Transparency International Survey’!
As a Caribbean nation whose vibrant, creative, cosmopolitan citizens continue to positively impact on the cultural life of our Region, it is becoming increasingly painful to also share Trinidad and Tobago’s multiplying agonies, not the least being the wastage of life at the hands of brazen armed criminal networks, of whom their latest victim was the courageous legal luminary, Seetahal.
If it is of any comfort to the citizens of Trinidad and Tobago — and they should be aware at this time of national mourning over the shocking execution, a week ago, of Seetahal — their agony is widely shared across the Caribbean Community, where citizens of every race and class are uneasily coping with a mindless criminal epidemic which has methodically taken root over the years by an evolving mix of myopic opportunistic party politicking and complicity by varying sectors in drugs, arms and human trafficking, which have seriously scarred the Caribbean landscape with depressing data from regional and international institutions and agencies.

Sadly, the spreading criminality has occasionally been aided by corrupt elements within the security forces and some State agencies’ keepers of the gate against the criminal underworld.
This has resulted, within recent years, of murders being counted in the hundreds annually for countries like Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago, with Guyana following closely among the so-called ‘worse trio’. But no CARICOM partner state has escaped being affected by the criminal epidemic.
In comparative terms, the criminal blood-letting, reputedly aided and abetted by extra-regional entities, could well give false comfort to some CARICOM states — Barbados, for instance — when bracketed alongside the ‘worse trio’.
The harsh reality is that those involved in the sickening sex crimes and spiralling cases of human and drug-trafficking and gun-running have no respect for territorial and legal boundaries, or cultural norms.

Now, while the Caribbean Development Bank, like the World Bank, is also reflecting in reports the troubling statistics relating to crime and violence in the Caribbean Region, has come the horrors of the execution of Seetahal, the 58-year-old iconic attorney of Trinidad and Tobago’s criminal justice system.

As Columnist
On reflection, it was my good fortune to have had some encounters with her during visits to Trinidad and Tobago. In addition to being highly respected by her peers, the senior counsel was widely admired for her professional competence across political parties. She had sustained a keen interest in the media, beyond being a columnist –first for the Trinidad Guardian, and up to the time of her assassination, the Trinidad Express.
Consistent with a habit of courageously facing up to the challenges of her legal profession, and also revealing awareness of the social functions of the news media, her last Express column was to reflect those very qualities on the night she was ruthlessly shot to death by two gunmen, with five bullets, including two to her head and one to the chest, while driving home .
Viewed as an ally of press freedom and an eloquent defender of independence of the judiciary, Seetahal’s last column was an open challenge to a recent controversial letter by resigned Solicitor General Eleanor Donaldson-Honeywell to explain “what exactly” she wanted the Attorney General (Anand Ramlogan) to “investigate” in relation to reported alleged questionable practices between lawyers acting for the State and prison officers.

It is of relevance to note that, following a decision by Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar to forward the ex-Solicitor General’s letter to the Attorney General, she also advised him to invite the Prison Officers Association (POA), among other stakeholders, to address the issue of the claimed questionable practices.
However, the POA surprisingly lost no time in announcing its refusal to meet with the AG on the issue. Opposition Leader and leader of the People’s National Movement (PNM), Keith Rowley, on the other hand, thought it necessary to move with alacrity in hailing the POA’s response, consistent with his own position in favour of an “independent” probe. This is now an ongoing issue.
Against the backdrop of the controversy involving correspondence between the ex-Solicitor General and the Prime Minister, and relatedly the Prison Officers Association and the Attorney General, speculations have emerged about the agenda of the hired guns in the execution of Seetahal. The speculations have extended to a current murder trial (the Vindra Naipaul-Coolman case) in which the slain senior counsel and Express columnist was one of the lead prosecutors.

Award and Plea
With the government in Port-of-Spain adding TT$2.5 million to an earlier ‘Crimestoppers’ $1 million award by the police (TT$1 valued 16 US cents) for any information leading to the arrest and trial of Seetahal’s executioners, acting Police Commissioner Stephen Williams made a nation-wide appeal for help…. “Let us work together as one country…” was his public plea.
Regrettably, the “one country” concept is being constantly eroded by narrow, divisive party politics — a curse afflicting not only Trinidad and Tobago, but a number of countries across this Region, Guyana and Jamaica being other examples.
Yet, the alternative to national cooperation is most grim for a multi-ethnic nation like Trinidad and Tobago, which has survived some serious civil disturbances over the years, and a botched “Black Muslimeen” coup with many unresolved questions.
Given the nature of the criminal networks nationally, regionally and internationally, all governments of CARICOM would be advised to have their respective security agencies/ services work as closely as possible to help Trinidad and Tobago bring to justice the killers of Dana Seetahal. After all, most CARICOM states would have varying experiences of execution-style killings by the criminal underworld.
For its part, Trinidad and Tobago, which has emerged as the shopping metropolis for many CARICOM citizens as well as a valued aid and trade partner within our 15-member Community, must be seen to be moving with unity and firm resolve to uproot the embedded criminal networks that continue to mock the law-enforcement agencies, make virtual prisoners of citizens in their homes; and, tragically, continue to waste lives like that of Dana Seetahal.

Soca star Montano, who had rushed to the scene of the crime on Saturday night, wept with mourners while serenading Seetahal at her funeral on Thursday: “Dana, as a country we love you; as a family we love you…”

Now for the police progress report in their hunt for Seetahal’s hired guns: Sadly, their performance ratings in capturing killers and others of the criminal underworld is not encouraging. The same could well be said of other police services, including Jamaica’s and Guyana’s.

(Analysis by Rickey Singh)