Students urged to reject crime and violence

Minister in the Office of the Attorney General with Responsibility for Crime Prevention, Corey Lane is urging the island’s youth to choose peace over violence.

Lane, who spoke briefly at the launch of the Tyrese Caesar Foundation’s Anti-Violence Peace Programme at Blackman and Gollop Primary School on Wednesday, warned students that a life of crime and violence often leads to destruction and a slew of other issues.

“There are too many people in our society today – whether we look in our home communities, whether we look in our schools, or across the world – that choose war over peace. What does it bring but pain, mayhem, destruction, death, depression, sadness? . . . But peace brings to you joy, prosperity and a good feeling,” he said.

“Sometimes, to be a badman and a badgirl and so on, it [looks] cool; I must admit, it does look real good. But at the end of the day . . . it just brings problems.”

The P.E.A.C.E. Programme launched by the Tyrese Caesar Foundation, which is working with the National Peace Programme, aims to create a safe, supportive school climate for students to learn in; encourage students to take responsibility for their part in maintaining safe school environments, including student participation in safety and peace initiatives; reiterate that students report potential problems to school officials; remind students of the importance of resisting peer pressure to act irresponsibly; encourage anonymous reporting systems and other steps aimed at reducing the level of violence and bullying within schools

Lane also told the students briefly of work he did in the past within the schools and prison system, and stressed that on his visits, the similarities between prisoners and some of the students he saw in some schools were worrying.

“I used to go to primary schools in the morning and prison in the afternoon. One day I did it in reverse and it caused me great pause; it caused me to check myself. What I saw in the primary schools at that time, I felt like I was seeing the beginning of persons on a pathway to prison – the same language, dirty words, the same tattoos, and all of that. I said to myself it is really at this level that we must engage with you, to help you to understand why it is you should choose peace.

“I am here to tell you that I have seen so many instances, so many people who have chosen violence…and what they have become in life,” Lane told the students.

Rhonda Bryan-Hutson, coordinator for the anti-violence programme within the schools, also told the students that too many lives have been lost to gun violence and that peace must be the answer and the way forward.

“We are losing so many lives every day – whether they are children, teenagers, adults, we are losing them to gun violence. That is why we are here, to advocate the message of peace – Put down the guns, let us advocate for peace [and] take our nation forward,” she said.
(SB)