Re­cent­ly, in T&T, the term "sedi­tion" was used in the pub­lic do­main. It sub­se­quent­ly be­came the sub­ject of much pub­lic dis­cus­sion.

Here, we will ex­plain the sedi­tion laws as well as clear up any con­fu­sion with sedi­tion and trea­son. We make ref­er­ence to the Sedi­tion Act (No. 10 of 1920 and its amend­ments in 1961, 1969, 1971 and 1976) and the Trea­son Act (No. 16 of 1842 and its amend­ments in 1979).

Sedi­tious acts can come through sev­er­al forms in­clud­ing pub­li­ca­tions, e.g., news­pa­pers and pe­ri­od­i­cal pub­li­ca­tions as well as through state­ments. State­ments are words spo­ken, writ­ten or record­ed as well as signs or oth­er vis­i­ble rep­re­sen­ta­tions.

It is very im­por­tant that sedi­tious in­tent be proven to get a con­vic­tion. What does this in­clude?

First, sedi­tious in­tent brings ha­tred or con­tempt, or ex­cites dis­af­fec­tion against the gov­ern­ment, the con­sti­tu­tion, par­lia­ment or the jus­tice sys­tem.

Sec­ond, sedi­tious in­tent is an in­ten­tion to ex­cite some­one to at­tempt to use un­law­ful means to al­ter sit­u­a­tions that were pre­sent­ed to them.

Third, it can have the in­tent to raise dis­con­tent or dis­af­fec­tion among per­sons liv­ing in T&T.

Fourth, sedi­tious in­tent can en­gen­der or pro­mote the fol­low­ing two emo­tions:

(a) feel­ings of ill-will or hos­til­i­ty be­tween one or more sec­tions of the com­mu­ni­ty

(b) feel­ings of ill-will to­wards, hos­til­i­ty to or con­tempt for any class of per­sons in T&T that are dis­tin­guished by race, colour, re­li­gion, pro­fes­sion, call­ing or em­ploy­ment

Fifth, sedi­tious in­tent can pro­mote with in­tent the de­struc­tion of iden­ti­fi­able groups through the com­mis­sion of any of the fol­low­ing:

(a) killing mem­bers of the group

(b) de­lib­er­ate­ly in­flict­ing on a group con­di­tions of life to bring about its phys­i­cal de­struc­tion

Now, we see the wide range of sedi­tious in­tent from rais­ing up emo­tions to killing per­sons!

How­ev­er, the fol­low­ing le­gal pro­vi­sion is crit­i­cal to note. An act, speech, state­ment or pub­li­ca­tion can­not be deemed sedi­tious by rea­son if it in­tends to:

(a) show that the gov­ern­ment has mis­led or mis­tak­en in its mea­sures, or

(b) point out er­rors or de­fects in the gov­ern­ment or con­sti­tu­tion

Fur­ther, if the shar­ing of ma­te­r­i­al through pub­li­ca­tions or state­ments is done with the in­tent to re­form or fix the prob­lem or even to ex­cite per­sons to take law­ful means to change these sit­u­a­tions that were caus­ing feel­ings of ill-will, hos­til­i­ty or con­tempt be­tween sec­tions of the com­mu­ni­ty or class­es in T&T, then it can­not be clas­si­fied as sedi­tious.

In ad­di­tion, the law al­so pro­vides for per­sons who may have sedi­tious ma­te­r­i­al and did not know that it was sedi­tious; they can­not be con­vict­ed of sedi­tion as well.

The law stip­u­lates that if a per­son com­mits or at­tempts to com­mit a sedi­tious act in the var­i­ous forms iden­ti­fied ear­li­er, if such a per­son re­ceived a sum­ma­ry con­vic­tion (usu­al­ly by a mag­is­trate), he gets a fine of $3,000 and 2 years im­pris­on­ment. If he re­ceives a con­vic­tion on in­dict­ment (usu­al­ly by a judge and ju­ry in the high court), he gets a fine of $ 20,000 and 5 years im­pris­on­ment.

Did you know that if the Pres­i­dent of T&T is of the opin­ion that any pub­li­ca­tion or state­ment is sedi­tious he may is­sue an Or­der to pro­hib­it it from com­ing in­to the coun­try?

If any­one im­ports, prints, pub­lish­es, copies, re­pro­duces, com­mu­ni­cates ma­te­ri­als that are list­ed as sedi­tious, up­on sum­ma­ry con­vic­tion, he re­ceives a fine of $10,000 or 3 years im­pris­on­ment. If he is con­vict­ed in the high court as an in­dictable of­fence, the pun­ish­ment is 5 years im­pris­on­ment.

There are some safe­ty pro­vi­sions in this law. For ex­am­ple,

(a) No per­son shall be pros­e­cut­ed with­out the writ­ten con­sent of the Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions.

(b) No per­son shall be con­vict­ed on the un­cor­rob­o­rat­ed tes­ti­mo­ny of one wit­ness.

(c) A per­son can al­so be pros­e­cut­ed un­der the Com­mon Law or any oth­er Act, but he shall not be pun­ished twice for the same of­fence.

We have heard per­sons liken­ing sedi­tion to trea­son. There is a ma­jor dif­fer­ence. Trea­son is where any per­son ow­ing al­le­giance to the state who whether in Trinidad or else­where (a) forms an in­ten­tion to levy war against the state or to over­throw the gov­ern­ment or the con­sti­tu­tion by force and us­es overt acts and (b) ad­heres to the en­e­mies of the state by giv­ing them aid or com­fort. The pun­ish­ment for trea­son in T&T is the death penal­ty. Note the vast dif­fer­ences in penal­ties for trea­son and sedi­tion.

Where can some­one find a list of pub­li­ca­tions clas­si­fied as sedi­tious? These are list­ed in the leg­is­la­tion. In fact, there is a Pro­hib­it­ed Pub­li­ca­tion Or­der where these are itemised. In the past, some of the pro­hib­it­ed "sedi­tious" pub­li­ca­tions in the Caribbean in­clude the Caribbean News Quar­ter­ly, West In­di­an Clar­i­on, Caribbean Clar­i­on, West In­di­an News, Caribbean Chal­lenge, Caribbean Gazette, Caribbean Ad­vo­cate, Caribbean Re­view and Guyana In­for­ma­tion Bul­letin. Some of the in­ter­na­tion­al pub­li­ca­tions that were pro­hib­it­ed and deemed sedi­tious were The Marx­ist Quar­ter­ly, World Marx­ist Re­view and The Carib.

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