“Ir­re­spon­si­ble.” That is how Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley de­scribed com­ments made by MP for Oropouche East, Dr Roodal Mooni­lal, that Chief of De­fence Staff (CDS), Dar­ryl Daniel, will be the next State se­cu­ri­ty of­fi­cial to fall vic­tim to a “witch hunt” in the on­go­ing in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to the Strate­gic Ser­vices Agency (SSA). 

Mooni­lal was speak­ing at the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) cot­tage meet­ing in Pe­nal on Mon­day. He sug­gest­ed that the Air Vice Mar­shall would now join Ma­jor Roger Best, who was fired as SSA di­rec­tor, and for­mer spe­cial re­serve of­fi­cer/self-pro­claimed spy, pas­tor Ian Brown, who was al­so ter­mi­nat­ed. 

This comes as an au­dit is be­ing con­duct­ed of the arms and am­mu­ni­tion at the ar­moury of the Trinidad and To­ba­go De­fence Force’s Camp Cu­mu­to. The base housed sec­tions of the SSA, which is un­der in­ves­ti­ga­tion af­ter many al­le­ga­tions in­volv­ing the il­le­gal trans­fer and use of firearms.  

“To­day, Kei­th Row­ley, Hinds, Young, and oth­ers have gone on a witch hunt, fir­ing the di­rec­tor of the SSA and oth­er staff mem­bers of the SSA on all kinds of crazy grounds that they trans­fer weapons and guns il­le­gal­ly. They cook­ing up all of that!” Dr Mooni­lal al­leged. 

Dr Mooni­lal said since Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions Roger Gas­pard, SC, on Sat­ur­day or­dered the re­lease of four peo­ple de­tained by po­lice, in­clud­ing Ma­jor Best, in­ves­ti­ga­tors would now search for their next vic­tim. The Op­po­si­tion MP al­so claimed two of the po­lice of­fi­cers in­ves­ti­gat­ing the SSA went to Bar­ba­dos to de­tain Brent Thomas. 

“So, when they gone now they re­alise that they can­not charge, so they’re look­ing to widen this in­ves­ti­ga­tion. You know what’s go­ing to hap­pen soon? They will now have to go and ques­tion or de­tain or ar­rest or charge the Chief of De­fence Staff, the head of our De­fence Force. That guy was al­so as­sist­ing the SSA in the con­duct of their du­ties,” he claimed. 

He ad­vised the CDS to stay in con­tact with his at­tor­neys, as he ex­pect­ed him to be ques­tioned by the po­lice. 

“That guy (CDS) was al­so as­sist­ing the SSA in the con­duct of their du­ties. Now, he has to keep his lawyer on speed di­al and as (UNC’s Sad­dam Ho­sein) will say he has to have a good, clean deed be­cause the po­lice has an in­ter­est now,” Dr Mooni­lal al­leged. 

Yes­ter­day, how­ev­er, the Prime Min­is­ter con­demned the UNC for al­leged­ly ped­dling lies. 

“The Op­po­si­tion al­ways like to be­have as though they have in­for­ma­tion that on­ly they could have had. It mat­ters not to them that it is not true, mis­in­for­ma­tion, or even out­right lies. If there are is­sues to be in­ves­ti­gat­ed, then that in no way means that it is an of­fi­cer be­ing in­ves­ti­gat­ed, nor should any rel­e­vant in­ves­ti­ga­tion re­sult in the un­der­min­ing of any­one or en­ti­ty,” Dr Row­ley said. 

Mean­while, Dr Mooni­lal ac­cused the rul­ing Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) of hav­ing a “deep­er de­mon­ic rea­son for touch­ing the SSA.” He claimed the PNM had an “op­er­a­tive, a ju­nior con­sta­ble,” who they hoped would spy on the Op­po­si­tion and re­port to the Min­is­ter of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty, Fitzger­ald Hinds. 

He claimed the ex-SSA di­rec­tor and oth­ers shut down the re­quest, which led to the cur­rent in­ves­ti­ga­tion. Go­ing fur­ther, Dr Mooni­lal said Hinds told Par­lia­ment last week that po­lice were fol­low­ing UNC MPs. 

Calls to Hinds and Daniel for com­ment went unan­swered.