“The talk on the ground, Madame Erla, is that the Government plans to kick you out as CoP next year.”
Those are the words of UNC Leader Kamla Persad-Bissessar, who made the comment during the party’s Monday night meeting at Chase Village.
According to Persad-Bissessar, “talk on the ground” is that the Government “plans to kick out” Police Commissioner Erla Harewood-Christopher next year and have a third “puppet” commissioner who may be one of the deputy commissioners whose selection will be examined by Parliament today.
Persad-Bissessar added: They’ll dispose of you in much the same way they did McDonald Jacob. Then, with the help of this ‘puppet POLSC’, a third ‘PNM puppet’ commissioner of police will be appointed come March next year when Erla’s contract expires–that’s the talk on the ground.
“Most likely, they’ll appoint one of the ‘hand-picked’ DCPs they’re bringing to Parliament–one of those three. They brought three notifications that will be debated shortly in Parliament. Most likely one of those will be hand-picked, to become CoP when they kick out Erla in March. We’ll talk more about that when we deal with it in the Parliament, but that’s their plan,” she claimed.
“Is it that we’re becoming a police state and our appointment in Parliament of DCPs this week will fast-track us in this direction?”
The House of Representatives will today debate the notifications of three senior officers that the Police Service Commission (POLSC) submitted to Parliament to fill three vacancies for deputy commissioners of police–Snr Supts Wendell Lucas, Junior Benjamin and Natasha George.
Persad-Bissessar said, “The political interference and favouritism regarding promotions within the TTPS have sent the organisation into turmoil. Officers refuse to take orders from incompetent seniors who have been wrongly and undeservingly promoted due to interference. We’ve reached this point of chaos in TTPS because of an incompetent ‘puppet’ Police Service Commission.”
“Their (POLSC) selection process has caused a massive spike in crime and enormous loss in public confidence and trust in TTPS … Their selection of Erla Christopher is the most blatant factor that questions their competence …
“So when you want to blame TTPS members, you have to understand who’s placed these persons in positions of authority in TTPS …”
Persad-Bissessar accused the POLSC of changing the criteria to suit whoever they wanted to put in office.