Rhon­dor Dowlat

Op­po­si­tion Leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar has sent a Cab­i­net Note to be con­sid­ered and passed by Cab­i­net with re­spect to the pay­ment of $1 mil­lion to the es­tate of each of the mem­bers of the pro­tec­tive ser­vices – Po­lice Ser­vice, T&T De­fence Force, Fire Ser­vice and the Prison Ser­vice –killed in the line of du­ty.

She made this dis­clo­sure dur­ing her ad­dress at the UNC's Mon­day Night Fo­rum at the North East­ern Col­lege, San­gre Grande.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar, who led the bud­get pre­sen­ta­tion of 2014, made that com­mit­ment in recog­ni­tion of the risks mem­bers of the pro­tec­tive ser­vices faced each day to pro­tect the cit­i­zens.

She said as Prime Min­is­ter, Row­ley had stat­ed his Gov­ern­ment's com­mit­ment to ho­n­our that promise.

On April 14, Min­is­ter of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty, Ed­mund Dil­lon, re-stat­ed the com­mit­ment of the Gov­ern­ment to hon­or the mil­lion-dol­lar com­pen­sa­tion pack­age pro­posed by the pre­vi­ous ad­min­is­tra­tion to fam­i­lies of all mem­bers of the pro­tec­tive ser­vices slain in the line of du­ty.

Cab­i­net has been asked to agree to (i) an ex-gra­tia pay­ment of $1 mil­lion to the es­tate of each of the mem­bers of the pro­tec­tive ser­vices killed in the line of du­ty from Sep­tem­ber 2014 to Sep­tem­ber 2016 in­clu­sive and (ii) pay­ment af­ter Sep­tem­ber 2016.

The Cab­i­net was al­so asked to agree that "the At­tor­ney Gen­er­al cause to be pre­pared leg­is­la­tion to give ef­fect to (ii) above for the con­sid­er­a­tion of Cab­i­net and there­after for the lay­ing in Par­lia­ment at the ear­li­est; that funds to meet the pay­ments in (i) above be iden­ti­fied by the Min­istry of Fi­nance in con­sul­ta­tion with the Min­istry of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty and that the funds to meet the pay­ments in (ii) above be pro­vid­ed for in the 2017 Draft Es­ti­mates of Ex­pen­di­ture.

When vis­it­ed yes­ter­day, a fe­male rel­a­tive of PC Sher­man May­nard stood be­hind her bur­glar proofed car­port at her home in Ed­in­burgh 500 in Ch­agua­nas.

When asked about whether or not she had re­ceived the mil­lion-dol­lar com­pen­sa­tion pack­age, she replied: "I have noth­ing to say with that. Ask the Min­is­ter of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty."

May­nard was on du­ty out­side the Port-of-Spain State Prison when he was killed dur­ing a jail­break on Ju­ly 24 2015.

Nisha Roop­nar­ine-Ram­roop, the wid­ow of SRP PC Govin­dra Ram­roop, yes­ter­day told the T&T Guardian No­vem­ber 5 would mark the first an­niver­sary since her hus­band was shot while on du­ty at the Guapo Po­lice Sta­tion.

She said to date no­body from the Po­lice Ser­vice or the Min­istry of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty have ap­proached her with re­gards to any com­pen­sa­tion.

"All I got was $10,000 to­wards the fu­ner­al. I know that the gen­er­al rule is once some­one is in­jured or dies on the job an im­me­di­ate com­pen­sa­tion is usu­al­ly giv­en but in this case no­body spoke to me about it," she added.

Ram­roop died at the Point Fortin Area Hos­pi­tal af­ter sus­tain­ing a gun­shot wound at the Guapo Po­lice Sta­tion on No­vem­ber 5, 2015.

Sec­re­tary of the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice So­cial and Wel­fare As­so­ci­a­tion, Anand Rame­sar, said he was hap­py to see that at least "some­one is mak­ing the ef­fort to bring re­lief to the frus­trat­ed fam­i­lies.

"We have been psy­cho­log­i­cal­ly bru­talised with the non-kept promis­es and the fam­i­lies are very frus­trat­ed to say the least. We have been to the Gov­ern­ment and the min­is­ter and have not seen any fol­low through," Rame­sar said.