THE crime woes of the country should not be taken lightly, as hoodlums are becoming more violent these days.

The school environment, bad parenting, lack of jobs, lack of police personnel and enforcement and the justice system itself are some of the factors contributing to the increase in violent crimes.

If violent crime is allowed to pervade society, it would impede economic growth as investors and tourists would turn away from the country.

Children are exposed to scenes of violence all round them. Rape, gang robberies, and house break-ins are all violent acts that children come to see and read through the media. In some societies, this has become a way of life.

In some cases it is the lack of parental care that has shown the way for children to grow up acquiring disorderly and violent traits in life that lead to criminal activities.

Neglecting children at their early age and allowing them to mix with the bad hats in society could pave the way for them to resort to violent crimes in their later years.

We find it near impossible to rid the country of illegals who resort to various violent crimes. Many are without any personal documents and more often than not they go undetected.

Worse, many of our youths are unemployed as many foreigners have taken up jobs meant for them. Despite the many job opportunities in the country, many locals are not employed as employers find it cheaper to hire foreigners.

Increasing the police force would be a good idea but re-employing retired policemen would not help much in curbing crime, unless we intend to use them to train young officers. The age factor would confine these officers to desk jobs. The cry now is for greater police presence in all neighbourhoods and within our reach when there is an emergency.

Corruption could also pave the way to criminal activities and this cannot be considered a trivial cause. When enforcement officers are vulnerable to corrupt practices, crimes will permeate society.

Our criminal justice system should be reviewed as many suspects, some charged with rape, murder and armed robbery, have walked free because prosecutors could not muster enough physical evidence to prove their guilt.

Our justice system should see crime as a chronic symptom in society and those arrested should be harshly punished once convicted.

Tolerating non-violent misdemeanours with no urge to stop them could directly show the way to violent crimes. Hence, there has to be a strong moral and political will to curb crime before criminals take the upper hand and become more vicious in their attacks.

M.A. NAIR, Bandar Muadzam Shah

Source: NST – January 24, 2008