The rapid mini explosions stunned those in homes and businesses nearby as the staccato refrain of gunshots pierced the tranquility of a sunny Monday afternoon. Immediate confusion was soon replaced by terror as people slowly made their way into the streets to fulfill their curiosity about what has become a regular occurrence in our streets and alleyways. “How many got shot”, asked one woman. “Lord I hope nobody dead” wailed another.
It had happened again. Young men liming in an alley playing draughts had been stalked by would – be assassins and deliberately targeted. What sounded like about eight individual shots to those in the surrounding neighbourhood turned out to be well over 50 bullets indicating that automatic weapons were used. The Bible talks about believers being fishers of men meaning that they are to go out and convince others of the truth of the Christian faith but St. Kitts and Nevis now has hunters of men. Cold blooded killers are stalking these islands looking for their next victims.
Yet an unanswered question stubbornly refused to go away. Why are so many young men just idling away their hours on the sides of the road? Time and again the story has been repeated. Young, healthy men in the prime of their life are attacked by their contemporaries while they were on street corners or in alleys doing who knows what. There is obviously a serious and chronic lack of meaningful employment available or neither school nor work appears to have any value. It is a waste of the only resource that this tiny nation has for so many of our most productive people to be marginalized from the formal economy. Can anyone be surprised that violent crime has become a way of life when so many young people cannot legitimately earn a living? This fact highlights the mockery of the government’s response. Advisor after advisor, consultant after consultant yet no one deals with the obvious. The economy has collapsed and the society is quickly catching up.
