The T&T Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS) and the T&T Mu­nic­i­pal Po­lice Ser­vice (TTMPS) will be out in full force in San Fer­nan­do for Car­ni­val to en­sure the safe­ty and se­cu­ri­ty of mem­bers of the pub­lic.

The as­sur­ance came from high rank­ing po­lice of­fi­cers, Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment Min­is­ter Kaz­im Ho­sein and San Fer­nan­do May­or Ju­nia Re­grel­lo dur­ing a meet­ing to an­nounce se­cu­ri­ty mea­sures which were im­ple­ment­ed for Car­ni­val.

Speak­ing at Li­brary Cor­ner in San Fer­nan­do yes­ter­day, Ho­sein said with the in­crease in the strength of mu­nic­i­pal po­lice of­fi­cers at the 14 Cor­po­ra­tions the of­fi­cers’ re­spon­si­bil­i­ties and du­ties have now been ex­pand­ed.

He re­called that when he came in­to of­fice there were 216 mu­nic­i­pal of­fi­cers and that num­ber has now grown to over 600 and it will con­tin­ue to in­crease as each cor­po­ra­tion will now have 100 of­fi­cers, ex­cept for Port-of-Spain which will have 200.

He is hop­ing that this will be achieved in the next six months.

“We are go­ing around the coun­try and we are tak­ing a soft­er ap­proach to polic­ing. We are sup­port­ing the TTPS.”

Ho­sein said the mu­nic­i­pal of­fi­cers are do­ing stop and search ex­er­cis­es and drugs busts in and around the mar­kets.

How­ev­er, the min­is­ter said he wants the of­fi­cers to en­gage in more foot pa­trols and vis­it the schools.

“We are go­ing to up our game at the TTMPS lev­el.”

Ho­sein al­so en­cour­aged peo­ple who would be vis­it­ing the beach­es, riv­er or camp­ing for Car­ni­val to in­form the Cor­po­ra­tion so that they could dis­patch po­lice pa­trols to en­sure their safe­ty. He ad­vised the of­fi­cers to gain the con­fi­dence of the pub­lic by meet­ing the church­es, NGOs and oth­er groups and to treat mem­bers of the pub­lic with kind­ness.

Re­grel­lo said they have im­ple­ment­ed a new pol­i­cy for Car­ni­val where the use of loud mu­sic by Car­ni­val bands will be strict­ly pro­hib­it­ed when pass­ing near the San Fer­nan­do Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal. He said the of­fi­cers will al­so be out in full force to en­sure prop­er crowd con­trol.

“Snr Supt Ce­cil San­tana (of the TTMPS) has as­sured me that there will be a greater lev­el of po­lice of­fi­cers in San Fer­nan­do as per­sons par­tic­i­pate in Car­ni­val or tra­verse oth­er ar­eas.”

TTMPS ACP Bri­an Headley said there will be a heavy pres­ence of of­fi­cers on the streets to en­sure mem­bers of the pub­lic have a very safe and peace­ful Car­ni­val.