ANGELO JEDIDIAH
angelo.jedidiah@guardian.co.tt
Activist Wendell Eversley is pointing fingers at holders of public office for allegedly aiding and abetting in human trafficking activity.
He made the allegation yesterday, as a group of citizens gathered at Woodford Square, Port-of-Spain, in solidarity to reject human trafficking in all its forms in T&T.
The issue has come to the fore recently after Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley claimed a 2022 US State Department Trafficking in Persons report had fingered a UNC Parliamentarian in the activity. Former UNC members Dr Devant Maharaj and Vasant Bharath have also supported Rowley’s claims, saying they were aware of the involvement of a member in such activity and the party’s hierarchy was also aware but turned a blind eye.
Commissioner of Police Erla Harewood-Christopher has since launched a probe into the claims.
During the demonstration yesterday, Eversley said, “What we are seeing today is a set of blasted hypocrites walking up and down as politicians in our country, sitting in our highest court, making rules for you and I. They are stink and dutty [sic] and they are nastiness in the closet.” Before the group engaged in a march around the Red House seven times, activist Jennifer Frederick asked citizens to educate themselves and change how they view women in society.
“We sometimes turn a blind eye to what is prostitution and human trafficking. You might see a young girl and she have three, four man and they tell themselves, ‘she wotless, she rel [sic] like man’ and may not know she has a pimp at home pimping her out. But we just watch it as ‘she is hot girl, she has tattoo, she like that, she has piercings’ and not understanding there’s a psychological effect behind it, or some economic reason behind it or some mental reason as to why this is happening,” she said.
Last Friday, National Security Minister Fitzgerald Hinds announced that a special adviser from the US government has been recruited to assist with investigating cases of human trafficking and bringing local offenders to justice.
While Eversley commended this, he is pleading with citizens to not allow people they know or their elected leaders to get away with such crimes.
“I want to see men and women of integrity in our highest office in our country. We have to stand up for it. We cannot say that we are PNM till we dead or UNC till we dead. We have to say we are Trinidadian and Tobagonian till we dead and that country comes first.”