ST. GEORGE’S, Grenada, CMC – Less than a week after one Caribbean Community (CARICOM) leader urged the United States to help curb the importation of illegal guns into the region. Grenada’s Prime Minister Dickon Mitchell has admitted that the unlawful importation of firearms and ammunition threatens the island.
He is promising his six-month-old administration will adopt a zero-tolerance approach to having firearms in communities.
“I want us to understand that the importation of small firearms constantly threatens our island(s). They are coming in barrels and containers, and don’t be fooled; we are probably the last bastion of little or no gun violence in the region,” he told a town hall meeting.
“St Lucia is rampant with shootings left, right, and center. We don’t need to talk about our neighbors to the south, Trinidad. We don’t need to talk about Barbados or Jamaica,” he told the audience that they should not take safety for granted.
“So, I don’t want us to take our safety for granted. Firearms are also seen as sports. There are ranges people will go to shoot the guns on the range and then go home, but the idea that we should be walking around with firearms is damaging to our culture, to our way of life,” he added.
Mitchell, who led his National Democratic Congress (NDC) to victory in the June 23 general election last year, was at the time responding to a question from a former police officer who retired from the Royal Grenada Police Force after serving for more than 25 years and was pleading to have the cost of the firearm license fee to be waived. He is now a farmer.
“I am not a fan of private people holding firearms, and that includes ex-police officers, and so to me, and I am making this clear, and I hope that I can get support from my colleagues, I intend to take a zero-tolerance approach to firearms in our communities,” said Prime Minister Mitchell, who is also the Minister for National Security.
“I accept that because of the nature of the work carried out by police officers, there will come a time when they should have a particular need to be issued with a firearm, but I will say to you honestly that it will be a hard thing for me to suggest that they don’t pay the licensing fee.
“Of course, persons have a right to apply and are vetted by the Police, and they do have a right to be issued with a firearm, but I have indicated to the police officer that they have to demonstrate an exceptional need for the firearm,” Mitchell said as he sought to strengthen the argument against private citizens having firearms in their possession.
In recent weeks, guns and ammunition were discovered after the Customs and Police officers searched the main St George’s Port. Last year, the police confiscated several illegal firearms as part of drug bust operations and search warrants.
According to the Firearms legislation, any person who is found guilty of possession of a firearm on summary conviction shall be subject to a fine of not less than EC$4,000 (One EC dollar=US$0.37 cents) and not more than EC$20,000 and to imprisonment for not less than two and not more than five years.
If convicted on an indictable offense, the person shall be subject to a fine of not less than EC$20,000 and not more than EC$60,000 and to imprisonment for not less than five and not more than 20 years.
Last week, St. Vincent and the Grenadines Prime Minister Dr. Ralph Gonsalves called on Washington to do more to curb the easy access of illegal weapons and their easy exportation to Latin America and the Caribbean.
Gonsalves, speaking on a radio program here, decried the proliferation of guns manufactured in the United States and violence associated with the illegal drugs trade as the leading cause for the high rate of murders in some Latin American and Caribbean countries.
“The United States of America had to do something about not having easy access to guns and the easy exportation of guns. They have the resources to help us with that,” he said, noting that Mexico has circulated a draft resolution to be discussed at the January 24 meeting in Argentina of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) “on this very matter.”
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