PRESIDENT of the Trinidad and Tobago Hardware Association, Joseph Callendar, is calling on the Government and Acting Commissioner of Police James Philbert to issue firearm users’ licences to hardware owners, after his hardware was robbed on Friday morning.

Callendar said he is appealing to the Government to allow hardware owners to carry guns. ’We are getting robbed and we don’t have any guns. We are totally unprotected,’ he said.

He said, on Friday around 2 a.m., he was asleep at his home, which adjoins his hardware - The Petit Bourg Hardware, when he heard noises coming from within the business place.

’I did not pay any mind to it because I have two big dogs in there so I thought it was them. A while later the noises intensified so I went to see what it was. When I opened the door I saw a man walking out of the door with one of my weed whackers, so when he went out, I ran and close the door,’ he said.

Callendar said he then called the police, but soon after he saw two other men approaching him with items in their hand.

Callendar said when the police arrived about ten minutes later he realised that his two dogs were dead.