The Mottley administration will shortly reconstitute the National Advisory Council on Citizen Security, which has not met since February’s general election, as gun-related killings continue to rise, Barbados TODAY has learnt.
A source close to the development declined to go into details but said the body had not met since the February 11 general election.
It was a troubling rise in gun violence in 2024 that first prompted Prime Minister Mottley to announce the immediate establishment of the council, which was tasked with offering solutions to the violence.
Among the issues on which the body, then led by its first chairman, law professor Velma Newton, would advise were anti-gang legislation and a gun amnesty.
The council has so far contributed to legislation and made recommendations on a variety of areas related to crime.
But the following year, Professor Newton resigned from the post, citing a number of shortcomings which negatively affected the council’s work.
She told the PM in her letter of resignation that she took up the post because “home drums beat first”, delaying other commitments in the process.
“However, the truth is that the offer was made and accepted with too many factors not having been thought out and conveyed either to the public or to the council itself,” the professor said.
A council of 24 people was “unwieldy” and that too many members were unable to attend meetings, she said.
“They were also unable to contribute on a large scale to the research effort needed at the beginning, to collect information on the government departments, religious and many other organisations established to provide counselling and recreational services to youth, mentally and physically challenged persons, parents and others. Ironically, some of them are the representatives of some of these bodies on the council.”
She also pointed out that no secretary was provided, although a budget was submitted to the relevant ministry soon after the council was established.
“This has meant that for nearly nine months, the chair, with assistance from one person who was not a member of the council, was responsible for whatever data collection occurred and for correspondence with council members.”
Days after the formation of the council, the Prime Minister’s Office announced its expansion by adding three laypersons and another group.
Mottley revealed then that, since announcing the council, several individuals and organisations representing various segments of society had offered to join the body that has been mandated to develop a comprehensive approach to tackling the crime scourge.
She added that, while she did not wish the council to be bogged down by being too large, it was expected others would be co-opted to lend their knowledge and expertise to the sub-committees the parent body would create.
The creation of the council, which was tasked with providing a comprehensive approach to combating crime and restoring stability, followed a mass shooting in Nelson Street, the City, in 2024, in which three men were killed and eight others wounded by masked assailants. Two children were also shot in separate incidents.
Mottley described those shootings as a shocking spate of terrorist acts directed at vulnerable citizens, and questioned what would motivate assailants to act with such recklessness.
She praised the young man who was the target of the gunmen in the bar for turning himself in to police.
In 2024, Barbados recorded 49 murders, a staggering 158 per cent increase compared with the previous year. Police later clarified that an additional manslaughter case brought the total homicides in 2024 to 50. This was the highest number of killings ever documented in Barbados in a single year, making 2024 an infamous outlier.
Last year, the country recorded 50 murders and, with only five months into this year, half that number have so far been slain, mostly by gunfire.
The National Advisory Council on Citizen Security is currently headed by President of the Senate Reginald Farley.
(EJ)
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