Five new mem­bers of the Po­lice Ser­vice Com­mis­sion (PolSC) have been ap­proved by the Par­lia­ment.

De­bate on the nom­i­nees, whose names were sub­mit­ted by Pres­i­dent Chris­tine Kan­ga­loo, took place in the Low­er House yes­ter­day, with the op­po­si­tion rais­ing con­cern about most nom­i­nees.

The new Po­lice Ser­vice Com­mis­sion now com­pris­es Dr Wen­dell Wal­lace, An­ni­ka Fritz-Browne, Ethel Hec­tor-Berke­ley, Roger Ba­booram, and re­turn­ing mem­ber Ian Ramd­hanie.

Dur­ing the de­bate, Oropouche East MP Dr Roodal Mooni­lal ex­pressed con­cern on be­half of the Op­po­si­tion bench re­gard­ing the nom­i­na­tions of Wal­lace, Ba­booram and Ramd­hanie.

He said in the case of Wal­lace, it was his po­si­tion on the Elec­tion and Bound­aries Com­mis­sion. He added that there was no men­tion of this on the CV sent by the Pres­i­dent.

He said the EBC is sup­posed to be the pil­lar of this coun­try’s democ­ra­cy, “and the men and women who par­tic­i­pate in that ought not to be in oth­er arms of the State.”

How­ev­er, in his re­sponse, Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Fitzger­ald Hinds said Wal­lace’s po­si­tion on the EBC was stat­ed in a No­vem­ber 6 let­ter to the Prime Min­is­ter and Op­po­si­tion Leader as well as list­ed on his CV.

“We de­mand an apol­o­gy in the name of Dr Wal­lace and we con­demn the ma­lign­ment of an in­no­cent and clean and up­right cit­i­zen who has of­fered him­self in ser­vice of this coun­try,” he said.

He al­so said some­one serv­ing on the EBC, as well as the PSC, is no threat to the sep­a­ra­tion of pow­ers.

In terms of Ian Ramd­hanie, Mooni­lal said the Op­po­si­tion Leader wrote to the Pres­i­dent on No­vem­ber 12 ex­press­ing con­cern that a com­pa­ny he works with con­ducts sig­nif­i­cant busi­ness with the Po­lice Ser­vice.

But, Hinds said, “the fear that they tried to con­jure up in the minds of the un­wit­ting pub­lic that be­cause Mr Ramd­hanie might have some busi­ness and at­tach­ment with some firm that may do busi­ness with the Po­lice Ser­vice and be­cause he is act­ing as part of the Po­lice Ser­vice Com­mis­sion for the ap­point­ment of com­mis­sion­er and deputies is a prob­lem, it is very disin­gen­u­ous, to say the least.”

Mooni­lal said there were al­so con­cerns about Roger Ba­booram and ev­i­dence he would have giv­en in an In­dus­tri­al Court mat­ter in­volv­ing the OW­TU and the Pe­tro­le­um Com­pa­ny of Trinidad and To­ba­go while serv­ing as a hu­man re­source an­a­lyst.

How­ev­er, the Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter said the Gov­ern­ment is con­fi­dent that all the nom­i­nees were suit­ably qual­i­fied to serve on the PSC.

Af­ter the vote was tak­en, all nom­i­nees were ap­proved.

Wal­lace will serve as the PSC Chair­man.

When con­tact­ed by Guardian Me­dia, Wal­lace said, “It is al­ways a plea­sure and ho­n­our to serve Trinidad and To­ba­go.”

The out­go­ing mem­bers of the Com­mis­sion are re­tired Jus­tice of Ap­peal Ju­dith Jones, Max­ine At­tong, Max­ine King and Ra­jiv Per­sad.