PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad: Calling it a 'Death March', thousands of local residents of Trinidad and Tobago took to the streets of the capital Port of Spain on Saturday, in a peaceful but massive demonstration demanding that the government put an end to the country’s spiralling wave of kidnappings, murders and other violent crimes. The march comprised persons from public and private sector groups, including labour unions, Opposition members of Parliament and business. Dressed in red white and black, which are the colours of the national flag, the demonstrators carried makeshift coffins, placards and banners with the words: “We want back our country”; “Where is the love T&T?” and “Enough is enough”. The protest march was organized by a citizens group known as the Keith Noel 136 Committee. The group was formed in May this year following the brutal slaying of Port of Spain, Belmont resident, Keith Noel. Noel was at the time the country’s 136th murder victim for the year. Under the watchful eyes of scores of police officers who were deployed to ensure law and order were maintained, the protesters began marching from Independence Square through the streets eventually stopping in front of the Red House Parliament building where three hundreds protestors took part in a symbolic burial to mark the over 300 persons for the year who had been murdered. Members of the government were noticeably absent, having earlier declined to be part of the march, saying it was politically engineered by anti-government forces. Saturday’s anti-crime march follows a petition which has been sent to President George Maxwell Richards by the Keith Noel 136 Committee calling for government to do more to ensure greater public safety. Ironically, at the same time the protest was being staged, a police officer was murdered in Laventille, a short distance west of the capital, bringing the murder rate for the year to 306, surpassing that of last year. According to the leader of the citizens group, Stephen Cadiz, the protest march was to send a strong message to government and Parliamentarians that citizens were fed up with the country’s crime situation. Reprinted from Caribbean Net News caribbeannetnews.com