Fran­cis Joseph

David Ab­du­lah, pres­i­dent of the Fed­er­a­tion of In­de­pen­dent Trade Unions (Fi­tun), who was ar­rest­ed last De­cem­ber 18 around the Red House while protest­ing against the pro­posed prop­er­ty tax, was yes­ter­day cleared by a mag­is­trate, who de­scribed the pros­e­cu­tion as an abuse of process.

Im­me­di­ate­ly af­ter the rul­ing, Ab­du­lah told re­porters that his ar­rest and pros­e­cu­tion were po­lit­i­cal. He said the last time he was ar­rest­ed, in 1986, the then Peo­ple's Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) Gov­ern­ment was top­pled by the NAR. Yes­ter­day, Ab­du­lah pre­dict­ed the same thing would hap­pen to the PNM at the polls next Mon­day. Ab­du­lah, a key mem­ber of the Peo­ple's Part­ner­ship, was ar­rest­ed on Knox Street, Port-of-Spain, on De­cem­ber 18, 2009, while he and oth­er mem­bers of the trade union move­ment were protest­ing against the Gov­ern­ment's plans to in­tro­duce the prop­er­ty tax, and to es­tab­lish the Trinidad and To­ba­go Rev­enue Au­thor­i­ty (TTRA) to re­place the Board of In­land Rev­enue and the Cus­toms and Ex­cise Di­vi­sion. Ab­du­lah was charged with ob­struct­ing the free pas­sage­way. Af­ter two po­lice­men tes­ti­fied for the pros­e­cu­tion, and a video record­ing was ten­dered in­to ev­i­dence, Dou­glas Mendes, SC, at­tor­ney for Ab­du­lah, made a no-case sub­mis­sion yes­ter­day.

In an oral rul­ing just be­fore 4 pm yes­ter­day, Mag­is­trate Lu­ci­na Car­de­nas-Ra­goo­nanan, pre­sid­ing in the Port-of-Spain Fourth Mag­is­trates' Court, ruled that Ab­du­lah's ar­rest and pros­e­cu­tion were an abuse of process. She said the ev­i­dence ad­duced by the pros­e­cu­tion was man­i­fest­ly un­re­li­able and there were too many in­con­sis­ten­cies. She said the video record­ing showed no of­fence was com­mit­ted. She said the po­lice ver­bal­ly told Ab­du­lah that he was free to march around the Red House, but that he should keep the noise down so as not to dis­turb the House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives which was in ses­sion. She said Ab­du­lah was ar­rest­ed af­ter the wit­ness­es said the de­fen­dant used the words, "block the po­lice." But Car­de­nas-Ra­goo­nanan said af­ter view­ing the video record­ing, no such re­mark was made by the de­fen­dant.

"There was am­ple op­por­tu­ni­ty for the pros­e­cu­tion to stop the fur­ther pros­e­cu­tion of this case, but this did not hap­pen," she said. The mag­is­trate said what oc­curred around the Red House may have con­sti­tut­ed an of­fence of dis­turb­ing the peace, but no charges were laid. She point­ed out that at the close of the pros­e­cu­tion's case, the pros­e­cu­tion want­ed to bring fur­ther ev­i­dence, but de­cid­ed against it. "The abuse seemed to have con­tin­ued af­ter the de­fen­dant was brought to court...There has been an abuse of the process in re­spect to the pros­e­cu­tion of this mat­ter," she said. As far as she was con­cerned, she said, this charge should nev­er have been brought. She then dis­missed the mat­ter, say­ing that noth­ing would be record­ed against Ab­du­lah. One of the three state at­tor­neys who was present in court in­di­cat­ed that the State in­tend­ed to ap­peal. Af­ter the de­ci­sion, Ab­du­lah want­ed to know why he was ar­rest­ed in the first place, and why did the State con­tin­ue with the pros­e­cu­tion. "All the ev­i­dence showed I was not ob­struct­ing," he said. "It was po­lit­i­cal, the politi­cians got in­volved in this mat­ter."

Ab­du­lah said when he was be­ing processed at the Cen­tral Po­lice Sta­tion, act­ing Deputy Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice Gilbert Reyes apol­o­gised for what had hap­pened. Prakash Ra­mad­har, one of Ab­du­lah's at­tor­neys, said his client was a vic­tim of abuse. He said it was now an in­sult to the court and the ad­min­is­tra­tion of jus­tice for the State to ap­peal.

?FLASH­BACK?

On De­cem­ber 22, 2009, act­ing Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice James Philbert, at a news con­fer­ence, said he was send­ing a file and a video tape to the Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions (DPP) to see whether oth­er of­fences were com­mit­ted on the day when Ab­du­lah was ar­rest­ed.

In his state­ment, Philbert said: "I said it was a re­gret­table sit­u­a­tion that some­thing like that should have hap­pened. There is, in fact, an in­ves­ti­ga­tion, and I want that in­ves­ti­ga­tion to come to me quick­ly, so I can ask to send it to the DPP to get some ad­vice in the mat­ter, to see whether we should go fur­ther with it or not." Philbert felt the po­lice be­haved in a very gen­er­ous way that Fri­day. He said the po­lice were de­ployed to the Red House af­ter the Speak­er of the House, Bar­ry Sinanan, com­plained that Par­lia­ment was be­ing dis­turbed.

Philbert said: "It is an of­fence to do that. Par­lia­ment is the high­est court in the land. Par­lia­ment must not be dis­turbed at all. "We have had in­ci­dents in the past where peo­ple di­rect­ed their at­ten­tion to Par­lia­ment, and so when the Speak­er com­plained, a mes­sage came that the pro­ceed­ings were be­ing dis­turbed, some­thing had to be done to deal with that dis­rup­tion," he said.