By AVA TURNQUEST

Tribune Chief Reporter

aturnquest@tribunemedia.net

PRIME Minister Dr Hubert Minnis yesterday reiterated his plea for the country to unite against criminality as he underscored the psychological toll murders wrought on the nation.

Dr Minnis said that the country would be destroyed by the traumatic impact of violent crime unless its citizens and residents collectively waged war on criminality and dishonesty in every instance.

He spoke as police announced the arraignment of a 48-year-old man in connection with the death of police Inspector Carlis Blatch, at Magistrate’s Court today.

Dr Minnis told The Tribune all law enforcement agencies have been put on full alert.

“The entire Bahamas is needed to declare war on criminality and dishonesty,” he said, “if we want to save this nation. Crime and criminality is not just against one or two individuals, it is against a nation, the psychological crime that occurs against a nation.

“We look only at the one or two individuals, those that were overtly affected but we don’t look at the global picture,” Dr Minnis continued.

“Those one or two individuals being robbed or murdered are impacted today, but the nation is impacted tomorrow. We are allowing these individuals to rob our nation of its future, we must declare overt war. When individuals get robbed, we feel sorry for one or two people but we don’t look at the criminality that occurred against the entire nation.”

Dr Minnis said: “To declare war we must report all illegal transactions, criminality, dishonesty to the police, that is the only way we can declare and change this nation as we move forward. We also send out notice to environmental destructors and violators, and traffic violators we will not tolerate these types of infractions. The police and all law enforcement officers have been put on full alert to deal with such matters.”

Insp Blatch, aide-de-camp to Governor General Dame Marguerite Pindling, was sitting in his vehicle last Wednesday, with his 13-year-old daughter, in a school parking lot when he was approached by a gunman and shot.

Police told the press on Friday that a wanted suspect from Fort Fincastle had turned himself into the Central Detective Unit.

ACP Fernander was careful not to draw a connection between that person and the Blatch investigation.

Insp Blatch was immediately remembered for his professionalism following his shooting. He had worked at Government House for 14 years.

Yesterday, Dr Minnis said: “We are engaged in two type of murders, the overt murder where a policeman, a father was murdered but there was also the potential murder of an entire school and families. The psychological murder, the traumatic murder that we don’t look at, is he could have caused serious damage to an entire school, our future generation. The psychological affect (of his murder) on the youth.

Dr Minnis said: “If we don’t declare as a nation, war on crime, war on dishonesty, and war on murders, all forms of criminality, then we subject ourself to the murder of a nation. The psychological murder that we are subjecting ourselves to, the destruction of a future of a nation.

“So I ask all Bahamians, just as we came together, the police force, defence force and all in searching for that one individual. We must declare war if we are to save this nation from the psychological murder by crime and other criminal elements, or we will destroy this nation.”