Geisha Kow­lessar

As the reign of the Mer­ry Monarch takes cen­tre stage from 4 am to­day, con­tin­u­ing in­to to­mor­row, top mem­bers of the Po­lice Ser­vice are as­sur­ing that all mech­a­nisms are in place to en­sure Car­ni­val 2012 is safe and in­ci­dent-free. Deputy Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er in charge of Op­er­a­tions Jack Ewats­ki said yes­ter­day that he was pleased with the an­ti-crime plans, adding that there would be ze­ro tol­er­ance for any crim­i­nal ac­tiv­i­ty, es­pe­cial­ly those bent on car­ry­ing firearms.

"I have con­fi­dence in our plans and con­fi­dence in the mem­bers of the Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice and our part­ners to ef­fec­tive­ly ex­e­cute the plans," Ewats­ki added. Last year, Ewats­ki came in for high praise from var­i­ous stake­hold­ers of the Car­ni­val fra­ter­ni­ty, in­clud­ing David Lopez, pres­i­dent of the Na­tion­al Car­ni­val Band­lead­ers As­so­ci­a­tion, who com­mend­ed the se­nior cop for his high lev­el of pro­fes­sion­al­ism, ef­fec­tive­ness and ef­fi­cien­cy. Up to late last Fri­day, Ewats­ki was busy fi­nal­is­ing strate­gies to en­sure mas­quer­aders and rev­ellers were un­harmed on the streets of Port-of-Spain which will be trans­formed in­to a sea of colour and mer­ri­ment. Fi­nal­i­sa­tion of an­ti-crime ex­er­cis­es al­so in­clud­ed in­put from dif­fer­ent or­gan­i­sa­tion, in­clud­ing rep­re­sen­ta­tives of the Na­tion­al Car­ni­val Com­mis­sion.

An­ti-crime op­er­a­tions for Car­ni­val 2012 be­gan just af­ter the con­clu­sion of last year's Car­ni­val, with se­nior mem­bers of the Po­lice Ser­vice con­duct­ing a post-mortem of pre­vi­ous plans to de­ter­mine strengths and weak­ness­es. Con­tact­ed yes­ter­day, a con­fi­dent Ewats­ki said: "Plans are in place...it is now for ex­e­cu­tion."

He al­so praised the ef­forts of his charges, es­pe­cial­ly those on the ground lev­el who had been con­duct­ing raids and search­es for nar­cotics and weapons. The se­nior cop added that he, along with oth­er ex­ec­u­tive mem­bers of the Po­lice Ser­vice, would be on foot pa­trol in Port-of-Spain to­day and to­mor­row. Po­lice said they would al­so be con­duct­ing ran­dom search­es of ve­hi­cles and pas­sen­gers trav­el­ling along the na­tion's roads and high­ways, adding that there would al­so be a height­ened pres­ence of of­fi­cers at var­i­ous ports of en­try and ex­it.

There would al­so be an in­creased num­ber of po­lice of­fi­cers at City Gate, Port-of-Spain, to en­sure that peo­ple do not en­ter the city with il­le­gal weapons. Po­lice said al­though there would be a heavy con­tin­gent of of­fi­cers in the cap­i­tal city, a large pres­ence of of­fi­cers would al­so be de­ployed in San Fer­nan­do, as Car­ni­val cel­e­bra­tions got un­der way there. They said a large num­ber of plain-clothes of­fi­cers would al­so be strate­gi­cal­ly po­si­tioned to de­ter would-be rob­bers as bands passed along the pa­rade route. Those want­i­ng to en­joy a more peace­ful time by camp­ing out at the beach­es dur­ing Car­ni­val Mon­day and Tues­day, or sim­ply stay­ing at home, can al­so rest as­sured that the var­i­ous ar­eas will be well-manned by po­lice.