Cabinet has approved the establishment of an Inter-Ministerial Committee to develop a national policy and guidelines for gated communities.
Speaking at Thursday’s Post-Cabinet Media Briefing, Minister of Rural Development and Local Government, Khadijah Ameen, stressed the need for a uniform framework for residential gated areas, particularly those situated on public and agricultural roads.
She said this aims to empower communities to protect themselves while ensuring legal compliance.
The Inter-Ministerial Committee will include representatives from several Ministries, including Planning, Economic Affairs and Development; Works and Infrastructure; Health; Public Utilities; Agriculture, Land and Fisheries; the Office of the Attorney General; as well as local government bodies and the Tobago House of Assembly (THA), among others.
Minister Ameen stated that the establishment of gated communities is one approach being considered to address the ongoing crime situation in the country.
“This is in keeping with the UNC’s position on stand your ground legislation. Stand your ground does not only mean owning a gun and being able to defend your home with force, it also means standing your ground and protecting your communities. So this would examine all legal avenues and approvals required for communities’ residents to come together by consensus, the agencies that will be required to give approvals, those that will be required to be consulted and to allow those communities to be gated. Now let me tell you that we have already had communities who have attempted to and were not successful and some who were given approval but there is no set policy.”
Minister Ameen noted that, over time, some residents have attempted to establish ‘gated communities’ and implement other measures to protect their neighbourhoods. She cited examples from the Valsayn and Penal communities.
“The residents’ association there has gone through with the regional corporations and several other entities to get approval to place a temporary gateway to restrict and monitor vehicles that enter the area and to take note of it. They have gone further to hire private security firms to work with them so that when there is an invasion of any sort, whether it is someone invading a home or someone strange in the community, they can monitor that and quickly respond before a crime takes place and it allows them to keep their community safer. While this does not restrict traffic, what it does is that it allows them to record vehicles that come into the area and monitor if someone is behaving in a suspicious manner. We also had one at the Penal-Debe region and these regional corporations would have followed the existing law. What we recognise as a government is the need to empower citizens and communities to protect themselves, and for this, we must have a uniform policy going forward.”