Rad­hi­ca Sookraj

Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter John Sandy yes­ter­day de­nied that the as­sas­si­na­tion plot against Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar and three mem­bers of her Cab­i­net was a ploy to ex­tend the state of emer­gency (SoE). Sandy was re­spond­ing to ques­tions from re­porters af­ter at­tend­ing a church ser­vice at the Poona Mir­a­cle Cen­tre in Williamsville. When asked whether the state of emer­gency, which is due to end on De­cem­ber 5, will be ex­tend­ed be­cause of the as­sas­si­na­tion plot, Sandy said: "Cer­tain­ly not! This will not be used to ex­tend the state of emer­gency. "In fact the Prime Min­is­ter at her press con­fer­ence said the same thing when the ques­tion was asked. She said it has al­ways been looked at and re­viewed. That pos­si­bil­i­ty is not on the cards."

Sandy said it was up to Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar to de­cide whether she should cur­tail some of her pub­lic en­gage­ments due to the threat. He not­ed that Per­sad-Bisses­sar's se­cu­ri­ty arrange­ments have been beefed up and law en­force­ment per­son­nel, in­clud­ing the army, are on guard. Sandy said he was dis­ap­point­ed at state­ments by for­mer prime min­is­ter Patrick Man­ning who said on Sat­ur­day that the plot had been "blown out of pro­por­tion." "I didn't hear what Man­ning said but any at­tempt at an as­sas­si­na­tion is not some­thing that can be blown out of pro­por­tion. It is a se­ri­ous is­sue, if he thinks that it is his opin­ion and I will say no more on that," Sandy said.

He added that he chose not to say any­thing fur­ther about the plot be­cause the Head of the Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Coun­cil had al­ready spo­ken. "The po­lice are do­ing their in­tel­li­gence and we don't want to in­ter­fere," Sandy said. He added: "The as­sas­si­na­tion plot is re­al. This is why the Ho­n­ourable Prime Min­is­ter thought it fit to share with the na­tion­al com­mu­ni­ty what is hap­pen­ing. She has re­leased some of the in­for­ma­tion but you must recog­nise that there are ar­eas which we can­not share. "All I am pre­pared to say is that I am sad­dened by the re­ac­tion of some with re­spect to some­thing as se­ri­ous as this and ut­ter­ances that at­tempt to triv­i­alise this." He not­ed: "This is a re­al con­cern and we have had in­for­ma­tion com­ing in from law en­force­ment agen­cies.

We have asked them to do what they have to do. We are not in­ter­fer­ing with that. We are hop­ing that in the not too dis­tant fu­ture that they can come with more in­for­ma­tion that we can share with the pub­lic." Asked how the Gov­ern­ment planned to boost tourism in the face of neg­a­tive for­eign trav­el ad­vi­sories, Sandy said: "Lets put this an­oth­er way. Were we to lose our Prime Min­is­ter to an as­sas­sin or any of my col­leagues to an as­sas­sin, that will have a more neg­a­tive im­pact than what's hap­pen­ing now." Sandy said he hoped the Op­po­si­tion will un­der­stand the se­ri­ous na­ture of the threat.

"We felt if there is a threat against the Prime Min­is­ter and oth­er min­is­ters, the pos­si­bil­i­ty ex­ists that an at­tempt could have been car­ried out in the Par­lia­ment as well so we felt it would be a good idea to brief the (Op­po­si­tion) so that they will be aware," he said. Sandy warned that mea­sures have been put in place to deal with any spike in crime dur­ing Christ­mas and Car­ni­val. The min­is­ter al­so said he had no up­dates on death threats made to Op­po­si­tion Leader Dr Kei­th Row­ley and Sen­a­tor Fitzger­ald Hinds pri­or to the state of emer­gency.