Op­po­si­tion Sen­a­tor Anil Roberts is ques­tion­ing the ve­rac­i­ty of the na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty threat that led to the shake-up at the Strate­gic Ser­vices Agency (SSA), as its now-fired di­rec­tor, re­tired Ma­jor Roger Best has not been charged with a crime.

At an Op­po­si­tion press brief­ing yes­ter­day, at the UNC’s head­quar­ters at Mulchan Seuchan Road, Ch­agua­nas Roberts not­ed that po­lice charged three SSA agents with mis­be­hav­iour in pub­lic of­fice. Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley told re­porters at the open­ing of the Diego Mar­tin Li­brary in March that Gov­ern­ment be­lieved cir­cum­stances at the SSA pre­sent­ed a threat to na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty that war­rant­ed a dras­tic in­ter­ven­tion from the Cab­i­net.

Re­call­ing this, Roberts prof­fered that a se­ri­ous threat could be a large cache of weapons, ex­plo­sives or a plot to desta­bilise the coun­try. But he said so far he has on­ly seen charges against the SSA agents for the al­leged trans­fer of firearms and am­mu­ni­tion be­tween law en­force­ment agen­cies with­out prop­er pa­per­work.

Roberts does not be­lieve those charges meet the bench­mark of a crit­i­cal na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty threat.

He said what might reach the thresh­old for mis­be­hav­iour in pub­lic of­fice is a prime min­is­ter ap­proach­ing a pres­i­dent to in­ter­cept an in­de­pen­dent mer­it list of nom­i­na­tions for Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice (CoP). He said mis­be­hav­iour en­tails a prime min­is­ter en­abling a pres­i­dent to cause the Po­lice Ser­vice Com­mis­sion (PolSC) chair­man to breach Sec­tion 123 of the Con­sti­tu­tion.

“The PolSC then col­lapsed, and the CoP, who was ranked num­ber 12, is now com­mis­sion­er, and now peo­ple are dy­ing in the streets, bars, and gro­ceries. Kid­nap­ping is rais­ing and rar­ing its ug­ly head again. Home in­va­sions all across this land. We were with­out a sub­stan­tive CoP for at least 11 months. Now, we have peo­ple who are not able to man­age be­ing ex­tend­ed. That is a threat to na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty. Not two .9 mm be­tween po­lice,” Roberts said.

Roberts claimed that Row­ley has been at­tack­ing in­de­pen­dent State in­sti­tu­tions and re­plac­ing their lead­ers with peo­ple who would serve the Gov­ern­ment’s pur­pose.

He ques­tioned if a re­cent­ly pro­mot­ed DCP who over­sees the SSA en­quiry was “fit for pur­pose”. He claimed the DCP’s in­volve­ment in the Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS) trav­el to Bar­ba­dos to par­tic­i­pate in the al­leged un­law­ful cap­ture of busi­ness­man Brent Thomas in 2022 was ques­tion­able.

Roberts said the SSA was good for the coun­try, but al­leged that mem­bers re­fused to do Row­ley’s bid­ding, so now mem­bers are “un­der at­tack”. 

“So who is this Cab­i­net of fail­ures to fire a man who has not been charged? What is the prob­lem you have with this SSA, Kei­th Row­ley?” he asked.

Roberts ques­tioned if Row­ley’s promise to re­turn the SSA to its pur­pose meant spy­ing on the Op­po­si­tion and PNM dis­si­dents.