• Gonsalves remarks Gonsalves remarks Mayor Bryan Baptiste’s decision to ask Police Commissioner Leon Gonsalves to step down is a right one. Gonsalves racial comments on Police Chief K.C. Lum and his cheif assistant spread like wildfire through the Police
• Gonsalves remarks
Gonsalves remarks
Mayor Bryan Baptiste’s decision to ask Police Commissioner Leon Gonsalves to step down is a right one.
Gonsalves racial comments on Police Chief K.C. Lum and his cheif assistant spread like wildfire through the Police Department, and then to the outside world through e-mail.
Though Gonsalves has a long record of service in the Prosecutor’s Office, with youth football and in other areas, racial slurs made by a community leader cannot be tolerated.
The Mayor wrote in an e-mail sent to The Garden Island this weekend: “Whether we like it or not, people watch our conduct. Leon’s words were wrong.Of even more concernwas the disdain and contempt perceived by the public in his feelings toward the newly appointed Chief and Deputy. People question whether there could ever be fair and impartial decisions in this arena. The challenge is that even if the decisions were fair and impartial, the public would never perceive it that way.” The Mayor’s decision ends speculation of how he would react to this situation, but may not silence critics who say he or the County Council should have taken immediate action on this situation, which has grown to become a political issue.
This incident is an indication of the now firm power of the Internet to spread news of events that were once easily covered up, or relegated to word of mouth. As in the tearing apart of CBS newsman Dan Rather’s bogus fax, a mass of people connected through the Internet have brought about action that has gotten at the truth, and brought about ramifications for those involved in this ugly incident.
