RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia Re­porter

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

Ten­sions es­ca­lat­ed in Bayshore, Mara­bel­la ear­li­er to­day as a fiery protest broke out in the wake of a po­lice raid.

The dis­con­tent al­so spilled over in­to the po­lit­i­cal realm with res­i­dents vow­ing to with­hold their votes on Au­gust 14.

One demon­stra­tor wield­ing a cut­lass, dragged his blade across the ground as he hurled ob­scen­i­ties.

When Guardian Me­dia ar­rived on scene, the in­ten­si­ty of the protest surged.

In a scram­ble to con­tain the fire they set, pro­test­ers re­sort­ed to us­ing buck­ets of wa­ter.

Po­lice of­fi­cers ar­rived short­ly and en­coun­tered the pro­test­ers, some of whom had con­cealed their iden­ti­ties by wrap­ping tee shirts around their faces. One of the pro­tes­tors called on San Fer­nan­do West MP Faris Al Rawi to in­ves­ti­gate what they called the il­le­gal ar­rests. She al­so ac­cused the po­lice of ill-treat­ing and threat­en­ing res­i­dents.

"It's gov­ern­ment ex­tor­tion! Stop do­ing this to peo­ple. Like all yuh moth­er and grand­moth­er nev­er pray with all you. Why are you ter­ror­iz­ing the chil­dren," she shout­ed as she ac­cused the po­lice of lev­el­ling false charges against the com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers.

De­spite the pal­pa­ble ten­sion, the po­lice main­tained their stance, ul­ti­mate­ly di­rect­ing the pro­test­ers to put out their fires.

This sto­ry is still de­vel­op­ing, and Guardian Me­dia will pro­vide up­dates as more in­for­ma­tion be­comes avail­able.