The Government owes the citizens of Trinidad and Tobago a very simple explanation. During the State of Emergency, hundreds of people were detained under Preventive Detention Orders because the authorities considered them serious enough security concerns to be taken off the streets.
The TTPS has now disclosed that 574 Preventive Detention Orders were executed during the 199-day State of Emergency, with 260 of those detainees subsequently charged.
So here is the question the public deserves answered:
If the State considered these people sufficiently dangerous to detain them during the SOE, what changed when the SOE ended?
I am not suggesting that anyone should be detained indefinitely without evidence or due process. The law must be respected and people who cannot be charged must not simply be imprisoned because the authorities suspect them.
But there is another side to this equation, the safety of the innocent citizen.
If the State had intelligence indicating that a person posed a potential threat, surely the ending of the SOE does not automatically erase that intelligence.
Trinidad and Tobago already has an Electronic Monitoring Unit using GPS ankle bracelets to continuously monitor certain persons under legally authorised arrangements.
Therefore, the Government should explain whether electronic monitoring was considered for persons assessed as posing an ongoing risk, where the law permits it.
The public should also be told:
How many of those detained under Preventive Detention Orders were released without being charged?
How many remain under active investigation?
How many were assessed as high, medium or low risk before release?
And what specific measures are being used to monitor those assessed as presenting a continuing threat?
We cannot have a situation where someone is considered dangerous enough to remove from society on Monday, but apparently poses no concern whatsoever on Tuesday simply because an emergency proclamation has expired.
The Government has a responsibility to protect civil liberties, but it also has a responsibility to protect the citizens who are not criminals and simply want to live safely.
If they were considered a threat under the SOE, the country deserves to know what changed when they were released.
This is not about politics.
It is about accountability, public safety and common sense.
Gordon Laughlin,
Westmoorings
