An an­ti-de­mo­c­ra­t­ic bill.

That’s how Op­po­si­tion Leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar has de­scribed the Gov­ern­ment’s plan to change the reg­u­la­tion for ap­prov­ing act­ing ap­point­ments for Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er. The bill will re­quire Op­po­si­tion sup­port for pas­sage.

“The Prime Min­is­ter is at­tempt­ing to ar­bi­trar­i­ly re­move the over­sight role played by our elect­ed rep­re­sen­ta­tives in the ex­am­i­na­tion of act­ing ap­point­ments for Com­mis­sion­er and Deputy Com­mis­sion­ers of Po­lice,” Per­sad-Bisses­sar said yes­ter­day.

“If Prime Min­is­ter Kei­th Row­ley can reg­u­lar­ly al­lo­cate time for fete­ing and golf­ing, sure­ly at­tend­ing Par­lia­ment to de­bate the is­sue of act­ing ap­point­ments for CoP and ap­point­ments of DCPS can­not be an ‘in­con­ve­nience’.”

She com­ment­ed af­ter Row­ley spoke about the “in­con­ve­nience” of Par­lia­ment hav­ing to ap­prove an act­ing CoP if the Com­mis­sion­er goes out of the coun­try.

He said there were plans to “change that reg­u­la­tion to pre­vent the Par­lia­ment or, we will try to pre­vent the Par­lia­ment from hav­ing to ap­prove an act­ing (ap­point­ment) for a day or two or for what­ev­er pe­ri­od”.

Row­ley said he hoped Mem­bers of Par­lia­ment would give the re­quired spe­cial ma­jor­i­ty vote.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar claimed the bill on act­ing CoP ap­point­ments would “de­ny Par­lia­ment the op­por­tu­ni­ty to analyse the nom­i­nees who are to act in the most se­nior po­lice po­si­tions, es­pe­cial­ly at a time when T&T is en­dur­ing a vi­o­lent crime cri­sis.”

She added: “This will cre­ate an eas­i­er av­enue for the ap­point­ment of po­lit­i­cal cronies of the rul­ing regime or in­com­pe­tent nom­i­nees. Iron­i­cal­ly, he is in­tro­duc­ing this an­ti-de­mo­c­ra­t­ic step while si­mul­ta­ne­ous­ly tout­ing con­sti­tu­tion­al re­form and open gov­er­nance.”

The Op­po­si­tion Leader point­ed out that in Oc­to­ber 2021 the court con­firmed that all act­ing ap­point­ments for CoP and DCPs must go to Par­lia­ment to be ap­proved.

“Kei­th Row­ley sat on this for over two years and dur­ing that pe­ri­od, was con­tent or saw no rea­son to amend the law,” she said.

“The gov­ern­ment’s agen­da is clear—they’re now mov­ing to ap­point a hand­picked DCP who would act in re­place­ment of Er­la Christo­pher as CoP when she’s in­evitably re­placed for chron­ic non-per­for­mance.”