Busi­ness­es across the coun­try are sup­port­ing the State of Emer­gency, which came in­to ef­fect at mid­night Sat­ur­day night.

Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley de­clared a State of Emer­gency and said the cur­few pe­ri­od will run from 9 pm to 5 am. He said this mea­sure was put in place to en­sure peo­ple have few­er op­por­tu­ni­ties to con­gre­gate and spread COVID-19.

T&T Cham­ber: We will con­tin­ue to act in the best in­ter­est of the coun­try

The T&T Cham­ber of In­dus­try and Com­merce said as the rep­re­sen­ta­tive of the busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty, it will con­tin­ue to act in the best in­ter­est of its mem­bers and so it sup­ports the Gov­ern­ment’s de­ci­sion to im­ple­ment the State of Emer­gency.

“Due to the num­ber of in­fec­tions and the strain on the health­care sys­tem, we recog­nise we had to es­ca­late the ac­tions to halt, curb, and re­verse the spread; there­fore we sup­port the im­ple­men­ta­tion of the cur­few. The sober­ing re­al­i­ty of our cur­rent sit­u­a­tion is in part, due to weak en­force­ment of the re­stric­tions, porous bor­ders, and ir­re­spon­si­ble be­hav­iour of the non-com­pli­ant.”

Giv­en the cur­rent re­stric­tions, the Cham­ber said the busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty must lever­age the dig­i­tal in­fra­struc­ture many busi­ness­es have put in place to al­low them to op­er­ate.

“Curb­side pick­up and de­liv­ery pro­vide ex­cel­lent op­por­tu­ni­ties for busi­ness­es to op­er­ate while re­duc­ing the move­ment and phys­i­cal points of con­tact among cit­i­zens.”

The Cham­ber al­so looks for­ward to re­view­ing the reg­u­la­tions un­der the State of Emer­gency, recog­nis­ing that cit­i­zens’ rights must be pro­tect­ed and ap­proved busi­ness­es should be al­lowed to op­er­ate un­der the terms of the State of Emer­gency.

“We im­plore every­one to be dili­gent in tak­ing all nec­es­sary steps to save lives. It is time for us all to do our part–No one is safe un­til every­one is safe.”

On Fri­day, the Cham­ber had called for fur­ther re­stric­tions in­clud­ing a cur­few and jus­ti­fied it by say­ing that they had got­ten calls from con­cerned mem­bers and they al­so did a sur­vey which showed that mem­bers want­ed stronger mea­sures to be tak­en to stem the grow­ing COVID-19 cas­es.

Rajiv Diptee

SATT: The health of the na­tion in jeop­ardy

Pres­i­dent of the Su­per­mar­ket As­so­ci­a­tion of T&T (SATT) Ra­jiv Diptee said that he un­der­stands why the Gov­ern­ment took the ac­tion as the health of the na­tion is in jeop­ardy.

He does not be­lieve that the State of Emer­gency will im­pact how su­per­mar­kets will car­ry out their busi­ness.

“This does not rad­i­cal­ly af­fect us in any way. There are al­ready the re­quire­ments to be off the street by 9 pm. What this means for us is that we will have to look at ad­dress­ing the open­ing hours for the su­per­mar­kets.”

Pe­ter George: I'm not hap­py we're in this po­si­tion, but I sup­port the mea­sures

CEO of the Trent Group Pe­ter George Jr un­der­stands why the Gov­ern­ment has im­ple­ment­ed a State of Emer­gency and he is con­fi­dent that the coun­try will get through this dif­fi­cult sit­u­a­tion.

“I have said that I sup­port stronger mea­sures. I un­der­stand that the Gov­ern­ment can­not call a cur­few un­der the Pub­lic Health Or­di­nance so they need emer­gency pow­ers, so I hope that the emer­gency pow­ers are used for the right rea­sons to cur­tail the move­ment of peo­ple. I am not hap­py that we are in this po­si­tion, but I sup­port the mea­sures tak­en.”

GREGORY ABOUD

NICOLE DRAYTON

DO­MA: Tough de­ci­sions have to be made

Pres­i­dent of the Down­town Own­ers and Mer­chants As­so­ci­a­tion (DO­MA) Gre­go­ry Aboud ful­ly sup­ports the Gov­ern­ment's de­ci­sion to de­clare a State of Emer­gency.

“We find that our coun­try is fac­ing a per­ilous sit­u­a­tion and we un­der­stand that there comes a time when tough choic­es have to be made and we be­lieve that this is the mo­ment. We recog­nise the dif­fi­cult po­si­tion that the po­si­tion is in. He has been try­ing to ar­bi­trate be­tween strict mea­sures and the wel­fare of the peo­ple in terms of their abil­i­ty to move on,” he told the Sun­day Guardian by phone on Sat­ur­day.

He al­so called on those that have been crit­i­cis­ing the man­age­ment of the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic to take a “con­struc­tive line.”

“We would like to echo the view of the Prime Min­is­ter when he re­ferred to the re­marks made by Se­nior Coun­sel (An­tho­ny) Astaphan in Do­mini­ca which was that those who have the in­ter­est of the coun­try at heart will be eas­i­ly iden­ti­fied in a time of cri­sis like this. This is a very se­ri­ous time in the his­to­ry of this coun­try.”