Yvonne Ba­boolal

The pos­si­ble re­lease with­out charges to­day of 16 peo­ple held for al­leged­ly plot­ting to as­sas­si­nate the Prime Min­is­ter and three min­is­ters will not au­gur well for the Gov­ern­ment says po­lit­i­cal sci­en­tist Dr In­di­ra Ram­per­sad. "The Gov­ern­ment will lose some pop­u­lar­i­ty...I don't think the plot has worked to their ad­van­tage," she said. "I don't know if it's true or not...The way they dis­sem­i­nat­ed in­for­ma­tion has led to doubt. "This will not au­gur well for the Gov­ern­ment. "I think they lost some cred­i­bil­i­ty over the way it was han­dled."

The 16 were de­tained un­der de­ten­tion or­ders and when the state of emer­gency is lift­ed tonight, they would have to be re­leased if no ev­i­dence has been found to charge them. Ram­per­sad said the Gov­ern­ment lost some pop­u­lar­i­ty with re­lease of peo­ple ar­rest­ed un­der the An­ti-Gang Act dur­ing the state of emer­gency. She said if it hap­pened again, it would ex­ac­er­bate the in­cred­u­lous­ness of the pop­u­la­tion. She said the gen­er­al sen­ti­ment would be that the state of emer­gency was a waste of time. "The feel­ing will be that if the state of emer­gency gave the se­cu­ri­ty forces ex­tra pow­ers, and if they ar­rest­ed peo­ple, de­tained them and then re­leased them what is the pur­pose of the state of emer­gency?" Ram­per­sad asked.

She said the state of emer­gency start­ed to be­come un­pop­u­lar in the lat­ter stages, even among mem­bers of the busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty. "There were im­ages of peo­ple be­ing ar­rest­ed and re­leased," she added. Ram­per­sad said if crime did es­ca­late af­ter the state of emer­gency was re­moved, it would be to the Gov­ern­ment's ad­van­tage. Com­ment­ing on the se­cu­ri­ty eval­u­a­tion re­port, Op­po­si­tion Leader Dr Kei­th Row­ley found in his mail­box which dis­missed the as­sas­si­na­tion plot, she said: "There is a lot that is blurred about the plot. "The pub­lic needs more in­for­ma­tion," she said.