Singapore
Home > Breaking News > Singapore > Story
Nov 24, 2010
CRACKDOWN ON YOUTH VIOLENCE
Curfew for at-risk youths?
By Teh Joo Lin
Related Link
SPEECH BY MR K SHANMUGAM, MINISTER FOR HOME AFFAIRS AND MINISTER FOR LAW
ST FILE PHOTO: WONG KWAI CHOW
TO TACKLE the problem of youth gangs, the police may be armed with additional powers such as getting at-risk youths to observe curfew hours and to attend intervention programmes.
The Ministry of Home Affairs is studying the feasibility of giving the police this kind of clout, so they 'can intervene upstream', that is, step in before errant youths form loose gang associations, said its minister K. Shanmugam in Parliament yesterday.
Giving an update on gang violence, he made it clear that the police have a 'zero-tolerance' policy towards gang activities and will hold on to this stance.
The police have picked up 144 suspected gang members since the end of last month. They include the eight youths since charged with murder in the Downtown East slashing case, and the six linked to the armed rioting in Bukit Panjang, who are being processed for criminal detention.
Mr Shanmugam, who is concurrently Minister for Law, said 45 per cent of the rioting cases this year involved young persons; about 32 per cent of them were linked to secret societies.
Noting the current of 'understandable public concern' over the recent incidents, he assured the House that the police took a serious view of such violence.
Read the full story in Wednesday's edition of The Straits Times.
joolin@sph.com.sg
Unk Dicko's Comments:
There is far too much talk and reports on what the government can do or hope to do.
There is also far too much "top down" instructions and "controls'' on how to cope with many of the challenges facing Singaporeans. This slowly fliters down to from top to bottom to the men in blue...who are somtimes clueless about the emphasis and directions they should take.
They lose focus in their fight against crime.
We need to have a special team or TASKFORCE specially trained to take out these ss elements in our society. The work of the SSB should continue but now shored up by the exclusive attention of this select group of special officers who will be a part of the future of S'pore's frontline home defence.
3 comments:
I think parents should play their part too in educating and disciplining their children. How could we be expect the State to do everything, the police have limited resources.
Youth curfew is an effective way to reduce juvenile crime in a community..
In the early 1990s, many American cities used youth curfews to combat juvenile crime. Youth curfew would help the young people stay out of trouble, and help them take care of their responsibilities as a child..
Thank you Sharleen for your visit and valuable comment. I agree with your sentiments and would hope to see such a change for action in our community policing.
Post a Comment