Fol­low­ing is the or­der made by Pres­i­dent George Maxwell Richards to en­act the state of emer­gency: "It is en­act­ed by Sec­tion 8: 1 of the Con­sti­tu­tion that the Pres­i­dent may from time to time make a procla­ma­tion that a state of pub­lic emer­gency ex­ists and by Sec­tion 8: 2 of the Con­sti­tu­tion that the procla­ma­tion made by the Pres­i­dent shall not be ef­fec­tive, un­less it con­tains a de­c­la­ra­tion that the Pres­i­dent is sat­is­fied that ac­tion has been tak­en or is im­me­di­ate­ly threat­ened by any per­son of such a na­ture and so ex­ten­sive a scale as to be like­ly to en­dan­ger the pub­lic safe­ty or to de­prive the com­mu­ni­ty of sup­plies and ser­vices es­sen­tial to life.

And now there­fore I, George Maxwell Richards, Pres­i­dent in pur­suant of the pow­ers con­ferred in me by Sec­tion 8:1 of the Con­sti­tu­tion here­by de­clare that I am sat­is­fied ac­tion has been tak­en or is im­me­di­ate­ly threat­ened by per­sons or bod­ies of per­sons of such a na­ture, and so ex­ten­sive a scale, as to be like­ly to en­dan­ger the pub­lic safe­ty to de­prive the com­mu­ni­ty of sup­plies or ser­vice, and a state of pub­lic emer­gency ex­ists in Trinidad and To­ba­go."