Strate­gic se­cu­ri­ty con­sul­tant Dr Garvin Heer­ah is urg­ing na­tion­al lead­ers to “em­pathise first, leg­is­late sec­ond,” amid grow­ing de­bate over the Gov­ern­ment’s re­sponse to Wednes­day’s protest linked to the po­lice-is­sued war­rants for the ar­rest of Ka­ia Sealy over the death of her com­mon-law hus­band Joshua Sama­roo.

Speak­ing with Guardian Me­dia yes­ter­day, Heer­ah cau­tioned against dis­miss­ing pub­lic demon­stra­tions as mere “pub­lic­i­ty farm­ing,” af­ter Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar crit­i­cised those who gath­ered in Port- of-Spain on Wednes­day in sup­port of Sealy.

The Prime Min­is­ter de­scribed the demon­stra­tions as at­tempts to pro­voke the po­lice and ques­tioned why sim­i­lar out­rage had not been dis­played over the more than 5,000 mur­ders com­mit­ted in T&T over the past decade.