KEVON FELMINE
Se­nior Re­porter

kevon.felmine@guardian.co.tt

Ch­agua­nas West MP Di­nesh Ram­bal­ly is urg­ing cit­i­zens to write to Bar­ba­dos Prime Min­is­ter Mia Mot­t­ley to get an­swers about her coun­try’s in­volve­ment in the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice’s ab­duc­tion of li­censed Trinida­di­an firearms deal­er Brent Thomas.

In a me­dia con­fer­ence at the Of­fice of the Op­po­si­tion Leader in Port-of-Spain yes­ter­day, Ram­bal­ly al­so called on peo­ple to send sim­i­lar let­ters to Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley and Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice Er­la Hare­wood-Christo­pher, de­mand­ing an­swers on what the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress deems as the State’s breach of a cit­i­zen’s con­sti­tu­tion­al right.

“They say, ladies and gen­tle­men, that the pen is might­i­er than the sword. I urge every­one in our coun­try to take up their pen, write to the Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice and de­mand an ex­pe­dit­ed in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to that mat­ter. Write to Dr Row­ley, de­mand­ing an ex­pla­na­tion as to why this Gov­ern­ment broke the law and al­so write to Miss Mia Mot­t­ley, ask­ing for an­swers on this is­sue which af­fects your con­sti­tu­tion­al rights,” Ram­bal­ly said.

Op­po­si­tion Leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar has al­ready writ­ten to Mot­t­ley re­quest­ing a probe in­to Thomas’ ab­duc­tion in Bar­ba­dos last Oc­to­ber.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar said Bar­ba­dos had fa­cil­i­tat­ed the TTPS in ab­duct­ing Thomas and re­turn­ing him to Trinidad, adding the mat­ter calls for trans­paren­cy and ac­count­abil­i­ty.

In a let­ter dat­ed May 10, Per­sad-Bisses­sar said the case had dam­aged the rep­u­ta­tion of both na­tions, which sub­scribe to the fun­da­men­tal rule of law. She called on Mot­t­ley to ini­ti­ate a pub­lic in­quiry to rekin­dle con­fi­dence.

In a me­dia con­fer­ence on Tues­day, PM Row­ley said he had no thoughts on this move, and Per­sad-Bisses­sar was free to talk with a Cari­com leader.

But in a state­ment post­ed to his Face­book page on Thurs­day night, Row­ley said there was one du­ly elect­ed Gov­ern­ment. He said Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s in­ser­tion in­to the sen­si­tive mat­ter be­tween the T&T Gov­ern­ment, Bar­ba­dos gov­ern­ment and the Roy­al Bar­ba­dos Po­lice Force was “whol­ly un­nec­es­sary” and “out of place”.

How­ev­er, Ram­bal­ly yes­ter­day de­fend­ed Per­sad-Bisses­sar, say­ing she act­ed in the pub­lic’s in­ter­est. He con­sid­ered if Row­ley was po­lit­i­cal­ly bipo­lar, hav­ing giv­en con­trast­ing views on Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s in­volve­ment. He ques­tioned whether Row­ley feared the Bar­ba­di­an gov­ern­ment would re­veal some­thing he want­ed to keep hid­den.

In a me­dia state­ment yes­ter­day mean­while, Per­sad-Bisses­sar said Row­ley should stop wor­ry­ing about her let­ter and deal with is­sues af­fect­ing cit­i­zens. She said he should al­so call the lo­cal gov­ern­ment elec­tions now.

“The coun­try is over­whelmed by mur­ders, home in­va­sions, rob­beries, un­em­ploy­ment, pover­ty, in­creas­ing food costs and de­clin­ing liv­ing stan­dards. These are the is­sues that the Gov­ern­ment should be con­cen­trat­ing on in­stead of at­tempt­ing to sup­press trans­paren­cy, free­dom of speech, de­mo­c­ra­t­ic prin­ci­ples and the rule of law,” Per­sad-Bisses­sar said.

She said a mat­ter in­volv­ing the il­le­gal ab­duc­tion and ter­ror­ism of a cit­i­zen is one of na­tion­al con­cern and strikes at the heart of the Con­sti­tu­tion and the rule of law. It was in that re­gard she said she wrote to Mot­t­ley.

Adding to the Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s sus­pi­cion of Row­ley’s trip to Bar­ba­dos last week, Ram­bal­ly said that as soon as the Prime Min­is­ter re­turned, Bar­ba­dos At­tor­ney Gen­er­al Dale Mar­shall re­leased a state­ment chal­leng­ing the use of the term ab­duc­tion.

But Ram­bal­ly ques­tioned whether Row­ley’s trip had any­thing to do with fa­cil­i­tat­ing in­dem­ni­ty agree­ments. He re­called the State grant­i­ng Vin­cent Nel­son QC in­dem­ni­ty in a cor­rup­tion mat­ter at a cost that tax­pay­ers bore. He said the Op­po­si­tion wants to know if dur­ing Row­ley’s Bar­ba­dos va­ca­tion, he arranged for an in­dem­ni­ty agree­ment for the Bar­ba­dos gov­ern­ment and all Bar­ba­di­an of­fi­cials in­volved in Thomas’ ab­duc­tion.

“In oth­er words, has the Cab­i­net or any of its mem­bers rec­om­mend­ed or giv­en any in­dem­ni­ty to any per­son or en­ti­ty of Bar­ba­dos and, or Cari­com for the wrong and un­law­ful ac­tions of the TTPS or any agents and, or ser­vants of Trinidad & To­ba­go in­volved in the ab­duc­tion of Brent Thomas?”

Ram­bal­ly said the Law As­so­ci­a­tion and Chief Jus­tice Ivor Archie have been silent, giv­en that At­tor­ney Gen­er­al Regi­nal Ar­mour broke par­lia­men­tary priv­i­lege to at­tack the Ju­di­cia­ry on this mat­ter ear­li­er this week.