Daylight robbery

We run today a letter written by the mother of a victim of daylight robbery that is rampant today. She did not direct her signed letter to us, but it was widely circulated and shared and a reader who received it from four different sources sent it on to us. We have withheld the writer’s name out of prudence and also because she did not write directly to us. But given the extent of the problem and its relevance particularly to mainly urban and suburban dwellers, we felt it appropriate to run it in our columns as a warning to others at risk. Believe it or not, the particular victim who lives a Sri Saranankara Road, Dehiwala, had his house broken into for the sixth time a few days ago. His mother says that CCTV footage shows the burglar “calmly and confidently breaking in, absolutely unafraid.”

The thief had battered his way into a house that was presumably empty at the time, using a huge pole which is likely to have made quite a din. But obviously the noise had not raised the alarm, possibly because the house had been targeted as it was relatively isolated. Alternatively, any neighbor who heard the racket chose not to investigate for reasons of personal safety or an ‘it’s-not-my-business’ attitude. Whether the thief, who had helped himself to anything he could lay his hands on including personal effects, shoes, a gas cylinder and all the food and drink in the house, was ignorant of the fact that his activities were being recorded on CCTV, we do not know. He may also not have known how to disable the security device or perhaps not seen it. However that be, hopefully the police would be able to use the available recording to catch the thief. These devices, like the ubiquitous mobile phones, are a tremendous help in law enforcement today. The CCTV in the home referred to may have been new in the context of previous robberies as otherwise some progress would/should have already been made.

The letter writer’s statement that “this is what happens when people have no money and are starving” will strike an empathetic chord among many. It is very well known that drug addicts will do anything and everything to feed their habit and god knows there are many of them around. But now a new factor, hunger, has come into the equation. The pandemic induced restrictions have cost tens of thousands of daily wage earners their livelihoods. They have no way of feeding their families or eking out a precarious existence. Although there is the Samurdhi social security net long in existence, it does not catch many of the needy and too often benefits go to the unqualified or the undeserving. Supplementary efforts like distributing packages of essentials or modest allowances have been attempted both by the state and private parties doing their best to intervene. But these are nowhere near enough and reach only the tip of the iceberg. Despite all professions to the contrary, the economy is in obviously bad shape and the country barely limping along. Resources for badly needed social security support for the poor especially in the current context are non-existent.

Added to all this, the police are over-stretched and its law enforcement and investigative capabilities have become increasingly ineffective. A significant proportion of the force have been thrown to provide personal security to various politicians. We have a Presidential Security Division, a Prime Ministerial Security Division, a Ministerial Security Division and many more. Additionally Members of Parliament are assigned personal security officers. Thousand of police officers being thrown into such duties was justifiable when LTTE and JVP terrorism was a fact of life. But today, with the war over, such deployment on the present scale appears unnecessary to most people. It would be a worthwhile exercise to compare the situation prevailing here with that in other countries particularly in our region. Excess manpower freed from such duties can be usefully deployed for other work like crime prevention.

We have a Minister of Public Security today but the letter writer asks “What security has he provided us?” The Kohuwela Police had advised the robbery victim to never leave his house unoccupied. His mother asks whether her son must then give up his job? The security service industry has been growing exponentially over the past several years with industries and even households taking the advice famously proffered by President J.R. Jayewardene during the JVPs second adventure to “Look after your own security.” Many retired policemen have set up companies to do the work that the police once did and these are prospering. Watchers of yore are something of the past perhaps found only in plantations and ‘walauwas’ deep in the countryside. People today are more watchful than in the past about both themselves and their property. Instances such as that highlighted are all too common though not heavily publicized. Many do not report suspicious activity to the police as they do not expect a useful response. The moral of all this is to ‘Be Prepared’ like the Boy Scouts are exhorted to and always be careful.