Opposition Leader wants answers on Warner, Partap

Acting Police Commissioner Stephen Williams is yet to provide a suitable answer regarding the status of a probe involving bribery allegations against National Security Minister Jack Warner, Opposition Leader Dr Keith Rowley said yesterday. “Imagine we ask the commissioner of police, the current one, whether he can confirm that the DPP’s advice to investigate what transpired at Hyatt where six and a half million dollars of our local currency came in US dollars and reportedly broke our laws...we asked the new commissioner of police whether he can confirm whether an investigation is taking place, or will take place, and we get a reply that he would respond ‘in due course,’” he said.

“So the commissioner of police cannot confirm that the advice of the DPP is being taken or will be taken because the office holder involved is too big to be investigated...that is Trinidad and Tobago in our 50th year.” Rowley, the feature speaker at the conference held by the Arouca/Maloney constituency in Maloney yesterday, questioned why some people appeared to be above the law.

On Collin Partap being fired as Minister in the Ministry of National Security for reportedly failing to take a breathalyser test, Rowley demanded answers why police charged immediately the “nobodys” and those with power were still being “investigated.” “Is that we have two sets of laws in this country or are some people above the law?” he asked. “How come the man in South who refuse to blow he get the book?

“No investigation, he just charge...Somebody else who hold ministerial office, he did the same thing but the commissioner of police is telling us he has not charged him but he is investigating.” Describing the “Partap event” as a blot on the country’s golden jubilee, Rowley said it also signalled to the country that laws and ethics did not matter.

“The Prime Minister is resolute in her position that ethical behaviour of public officers is the same as work ethic where, if you have a high work ethic, you could have any kind of unethical conduct because your work ethic is good,” Rowley said.