YESTERDAY I hung my head in shame when I read about 19 year-old Yamaguchi Hiroshi who was robbed and slashed by his attackers in Kuching on Monday night.

Ironically this young man had just arrived from Japan that morning on his way to Rumah Dagan in Sarikei as part of NICE, a Japanese NGO team which carries out voluntary projects in South East Asian countries.

While we can argue that robbery is not uncommon in cities all over the world and the incident should not paint Kuching as a dangerous city, it is disturbing that this attack occurred within the ‘golden triangle area’ in the heart of the city where tourists converge.

Hiroshi’s traumatic experience has caused a dent on Sarawak’s tourism promotion but even more damage was caused by the callous attitude of the policemen who arrived at the scene 40 minutes after being informed of the incident.

The fact that the officers told the wounded victim, a total stranger in town, to report to the central police station which was quite a walking distance from the scene and then drove off without even calling for an ambulance is a damning indictment of the poor training and lack of professionalism in our police force.

We can only hope and pray that this was an isolated incident and that our police force are generally better trained to handle such incidents.

The result of the investigation into the conduct of the officers who left the wounded robbery victim to fend for himself as promised by the district police chief and the steps to be taken to rectify the situation must be made public to restore the public’s confidence in our police force.

Another worrisome trend that was brought to a head by attack on Hiroshi is the rising number of tourists falling victims to snatch thieves and robbers.

Although Kuching is not the only city in the world whose tourism industry is hampered by this social scourge, efforts must be stepped up to curb the rising crime rate in the city to make it safer not only for tourists but for everyone else before the city is deemed unsafe by tourists.

There has been a lot of discussions, debates and soul searching over the rising crime rate in the city but so far there does not seem to be a light at the end of the tunnel in our search for an answer.

The reason for our inability to stem this surge of snatch thefts, robberies and vehicle thefts seemed to be not the lack of efforts towards solving this problem but rather the lack of coordination among all parties concerned towards a concerted effort to fight crimes. Rising crimes is such a complex and multi-faceted social problem it could only be solved through a combined effort of the whole society.

The police can only arrest, the judiciary can only mete out punishment but deterrent measures are only curing the symptoms of the illness of our society.

Unless we take a holistic approach and address the cause of the problem the fight against crime could never be won.

3rd voice is a regular feature initiated by AZAM and Sarawak Development Institute. Feedback can be sent to francis@azam.org.my