Youths need to be engaged in certain activities to drift away from the mind-set of committing crime,” Inspector Josevata Gasaukula said on Saturday.

The Inspector said this during the Crime Awareness Family Fun day, organised by the Sukanaivalu community in Nabua, together with the Fiji Police Force, Ministry of Health and few other stakeholders.

They organised a Crime Awareness Family Fun day.

The purpose of the Fun Day was to engage youths and bring the community together, addressing increasing crime rates within the Nabua Community.

“We formed a Neighbourhood Watch Crime committee with 18 members in the committee representing the 10 streets of Sukanaivalu area in Nabua,” Mr Gasaukula said.

“This is one of our community policing strategies working with the community and targeting the youth groups,” he said.

Mr Gasaukula added that after the Police made analysis of cases in Nabua:

“We realised that most crime cases like robbery, carjackers, grab and run and domestic violence cases, the perpetrators are mostly youths. That’s why we came up with this event so to engage and contain the youths to drift away the mind-set of committing crime.”

Mr Gasaukula said that the day’s event was the beginning of something new and they have plans for the youths to continue in engaging them to certain activities.

The Chairman of the committee, Niko Tuivuya, said he was impressed with the turnouts.

“This is the first time we’re organising this activity and we’re planning on organising the activity at least once in every three months.

“I hope this will bring us together and will be a form of bonding in the community,” he said.

“One prime goal is to reconcile the youths so we can see betterment for Nabua in the future.”

The Police will be working with the Mead Road Community in similar events and there has been discussions made with the church for a reconciliation service.

“The reconciliation service needs to be done, but first we need to engage the youths to change their mind-set and heart and hopefully this is done before the year ends,” Inspector Gasaukula said.

Edited by Jonathan Bryce

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