Act­ing Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice Er­la Christo­pher is invit­ing the pub­lic to cel­e­brate Christ­mas but al­so warn­ing them to keep safe­ty in mind.

In a re­lease yes­ter­day, Christo­pher said al­though peo­ple may be ex­cit­ed to cel­e­brate Christ­mas again af­ter two years of re­stric­tions, “nor­mal safe­ty pre­cau­tions still ap­ply.”

She ad­vised the pop­u­la­tion to be aware when shop­ping, con­duct­ing busi­ness at home or on the roads, and called on dri­vers to obey the rules of the road.

“We know this is a fes­tive sea­son and vis­it­ing friends and fam­i­ly is com­mon­place, but if you have to dri­ve, don’t drink and if you drink, don’t dri­ve.”

The coun­try is al­so on a rough seas alert.

“For those who go to the beach­es, I urge you to cel­e­brate with sun, sea, sand and safe­ty. Al­so, pay close at­ten­tion to the weath­er ad­vi­sories and alerts re­gard­ing sea con­di­tions over the week­end," Christo­pher said.

Christo­pher said po­lice of­fi­cers will be out in full force over the fes­tive week­end, not­ing of­fi­cers have been called out from desk and ad­min­is­tra­tive du­ties to help pa­trol. There will al­so be pa­trols by sea through the river­ine unit, drones and horse­back.

It was al­so a busy day for the act­ing Com­mis­sion­er, who pro­mot­ed eight more First Di­vi­sion of­fi­cers in a cer­e­mo­ny at the Po­lice Ad­min­is­tra­tion Build­ing in Port-of-Spain. Three of­fi­cers were pro­mot­ed to Se­nior Su­per­in­ten­dent and five were pro­mot­ed to the rank of Su­per­in­ten­dent.

This is the third pro­mo­tion ex­er­cise in the last two weeks, bring­ing the to­tal num­ber of First Di­vi­sion Of­fi­cers pro­mot­ed to 53, ac­cord­ing to the TTPS.

In a re­lease fol­low­ing the cer­e­mo­ny, the TTPS said Christo­pher ac­knowl­edged that the pro­mo­tions had tak­en a lit­tle longer in com­ing but were well de­served. She re­mind­ed the of­fi­cers of the need to work as “one team” with “one vi­sion” to do what must be done to safe­guard cit­i­zens.

“To whom much is giv­en, much is ex­pect­ed. Much more is re­quired of us. I ask that you be present out there, push your charges, and chal­lenge the crim­i­nals,” she said.