Trinidad and Tobago today is not suffering from a lack of laws. It is suffering from a lack of obedience, consistency, and consequence.
Across our streets, institutions, and public spaces, the message has quietly taken hold that rules are optional, enforcement is uneven, and compliance depends on who you are, where you are, and who is watching.
This is the context in which the country needs Kamla 2.0, not as a slogan, but as a phase of leadership defined by firmness, discipline and institutional reset.
One needs only stand at Curepe Junction or near SBCS in Champ Fleurs to witness the everyday lawlessness that has become normalized. Drivers talk on mobile phones despite higher fines.
Speed limits are ignored. Illegal U-turns are made brazenly in full view of traffic and pedestrians. Even members of law enforcement are seen using the Priority Bus Route without authorization, undermining the very rules they are meant to uphold.
When those tasked with enforcement model disregard, public compliance collapses.
The disorder does not end on the roads. Walk through any town centre and the scale of informal, illegal commercial activity is impossible to ignore. Vendors operate without permits, without paying taxes, and without regard for sanitation or public safety.
Businesses deduct NIS contributions from employees and then fail to remit those funds to the State; an offence that quietly robs workers of future security while starving public finances.
Buildings, including some owned or leased by the government itself, operate without full health and safety compliance. This is not a marginal problem; it is systemic.
This state of affairs has been allowed to persist, not because of ignorance of the law but inconsistent enforcement. One day, a motorist is ticketed for parking on the pavement; the next day, the same behaviour is ignored.
Regional corporations erect bold signs warning of prosecution for illegal dumping, only for rubbish to be dumped at the base of the sign the very next day, without consequence. Derelict vehicles remain abandoned on roadways for months, narrowing lanes and endangering traffic.
Mechanics routinely encroach on public roads, turning thoroughfares into informal work yards. The public sees all of this and draws a simple conclusion: enforcement is arbitrary and therefore negotiable.
This erosion of order feeds directly into the more dangerous forms of lawlessness now confronting the country. Gangs are multiplying, filling governance vacuums in communities where the State appears absent or inconsistent. The Judiciary is stagnant, with delays that sap confidence and embolden offenders.
Detection and conviction rates send a troubling signal: the system is more forgiving to criminals than reassuring to law-abiding citizens. When justice is slow and enforcement erratic, illegality becomes rational.
This is why the country does not need more speeches or policy documents. It requires executive resolve; a leadership posture that makes clear that laws will be enforced consistently, predictably, and without fear or favour. Kamla 2.0 represents the possibility of that reset: a version of leadership that understands that compassion without order collapses into chaos, and that rights without rules become meaningless.
To be clear, this is not a call for abuse of power or erosion of civil liberties. It is a call for discipline within democracy. Every functional society balances freedom with obligation.
Trinidad and Tobago has tilted too far toward permissiveness, where the loudest, boldest, or most connected routinely override the rules. Restoring balance requires a leader willing to absorb political discomfort in the service of long-term stability.
Kamla 2.0 must therefore be about consistency; the same rule must be applied every day to everyone. It must be about institutional accountability, starting with the State itself. And it must send a clear signal that the era of selective enforcement is over.
This country does not need saving from its laws. It needs to be saved by them. And right now, it needs leadership willing to insist that they matter; at this time T&T needs Kamla 2.0 more than ever.
