Gov’t defends decision to cancel Independence Day parade

PORT-OF-SPAIN (CMC):

The Trinidad and Tobago government Monday defended the decision to cancel an Independence Day military parade later this month saying “this decision was not made in a vacuum”.

August 31 marks the anniversary of the country’s independence from Britain that was achieved on August 31, 1962,

The Ministry of Homeland Security said that, instead, there will be a National Day of Prayer and that the decision was taken “after careful deliberation on intelligence” arising out of the current state of emergency (SoE).

Speaking on a television programme on Monday, Homeland Security Minister Roger Alexander told viewers that the decision was not taken lightly and “it did not take four or five seconds”.

He said Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar had “after continuous deliberations” announced the decision, taking into consideration also the safety of the citizens.

“We as a government had a decision to make. Persons behaving like this is the last time or there’s going to be no more Independence Day parade. This is not the case. We came into government and, on our arrival, we saw a lot of things I wish I could take you through, but I can’t because of national security reasons,” the former senior police officer told viewers.

Alexander said that, given the information coming to the authorities, “we have no choice but to protect our people, dismantle the threat and then we go forward”.

Trinidad and Tobago declared a state of emergency on July 18, nearly three months after it had ended a 105-day SoE to deal with criminal activities.

Police Commissioner Allister Guevarro described the events leading up to the declaration of the SoE as one of “grave concern”, telling a news conference that the police had received intelligence reports “whereby organised criminal gangs with persons inside of the prisons and persons operating on the outside of the prisons have formed themselves into what I would want to term an organised crime syndicate”.

The authorities moved high-risk prisoners to military bases as part of the crackdown on jailed gang leaders accused of using smuggled cellphones to plot a series of assassinations, robberies and kidnappings with help from criminal associates on the outside.

On July 29, Parliament extended the SoE for a further three months.

Over the last weekend, the NEWSDAY newspaper reported that police and military intelligence agencies had unearthed a plot to kill Defence Minister Wayne Sturge, and that several additional security measures have been put in place to protect the minister and those close to him.

Alexander said that a “threat to a particular individual might have been dismantled at this time” insisting that the authorities are being very thorough in their investigations, based on intelligence received.

It is better that I treat with this situation in this way than to answer a question later down the road,” he said, adding that Trinidad and Tobago must learn from the coup of 1990, when members of the radical Jamaat l Muslimeen group staged an unsuccessful coup attempt against the ANR Robinson government, resulting in the deaths of several people, including a legislator.