Stakeholders want action as 45 killed
Women's lives seem cheap
Shaliza Hassanali
Published: Guardian
Saturday, December 10, 2016
Diana Mahabir-Wyatt
Up to November 30, the Powerful Ladies of Trinidad and Tobago (PLOTT) had recorded 43 women being murdered or killed in T&T for the year.
This figure went up to 45 with the murders of 20-year-old Shannon Banfield, whose body was found hidden behind some boxes at IAM's warehouse in Port-of-Spain, on Thursday, and Cheryl Cooper, who was shot outside her house in Harmony Hall near Gasparillo hours before.
With the death rate in the 40s and counting, PLOTT co-founder Gillian Wall, yesterday described such killings as senseless.
Admitting Banfield's murder had triggered a rage on social media, with some women taking to Facebook to say they would boycott shopping at some stores for Christmas, Wall said this was just a display of people's anger and frustration.
"The (murder) figure is saddening. It's no longer alarming because there is a continued spate of aggressiveness and violence against women," Wall said.
"What is cause for alarm is that Shannon's mother indicated that she was going to Pennywise and thereafter IAM. Her body was found inside of IAM. That information as to where she was last seen...given what is taking place in our country, should have warranted a search of the premises."
She said every month between four to five women are murdered, which citizens seem to have now grown numb to.
"Whereas the majority of men are killed by the hands of a gun, women are stabbed," Wall said.
In reviewing PLOTT's 2016 crime analysis, 31 per cent of women were murdered by firearms, while 43 per cent were stabbed to death. Wall was unable to say how many people have been charged for these murders so far, but said many of the killings have remained unsolved.
"That is still being compiled. Even inside of the TTPS they are still working on those things," Wall said.
Also commenting on the issue, women's activist Diana Mahabir-Wyatt said while social media became enraged on hearing about Banfield's death, nothing will come out of it.
Saying that T&T's detection rate was very poor, Mahabir-Wyatt said 90 per cent of the country's murders go unsolved.
"Then they become cold cases. It is extremely dangerous to be a woman in Trinidad and Tobago. You have to be very brave as a woman to walk the streets by yourself."
In the coming days, Mahabir-Wyatt said the country would see, "politicians cry real tears and they would say all the things about how terrible it is. But they are not going to do anything. They would express horror like everybody else. But to have somebody do something.
"If you ask me, I have lived in this woman-hating culture for too long and nothing has been done to make it any better. Nothing is going to happen. We have had the Japanese girl who was killed. Several other girls have disappeared. Women's lives are cheap."
Mahabir-Wyatt urged women to walk in groups or with an escort when going out in public, but added "women should be able to walk down the street without being harassed."
Mahabir-Wyatt said many young women have expressed disgust that they no longer feel comfortable walking the streets without being jeered, harassed or face some obscene comment by a man.
"It's traumatising and has been making life uncomfortable just to live here."
Mahabir-Wyatt said while many women have vanished, "a lot of the disappearing.... we suspect is human trafficking. We are not getting positive proof of it. They go missing and their bodies are found somewhere in a remote place."
She feels the installation of CCTV cameras in buildings, stores and public places should be given priority by the Government.
Member of the Caribbean Association for Feminist Research Tara Ramoutar meanwhile said the issue of women going missing and then turning up dead was "totally outrageous."
She said women have to ban together and take some serious positions.
"However, people in authority are taking this too lightly... as if another life has gone.... and that is it."
