Pres­i­dent of Fire­works Use Suf­fer­ers (FUS), Nali­ni Di­al, says the pro­posed reg­u­la­tions on fire­works put for­ward by the At­tor­ney Gen­er­al Faris Al Rawi, do not go far enough, and will not bring an end to the suf­fer­ing en­dured by chil­dren, the el­der­ly, the in­firm and an­i­mals.

In a news re­lease, Ms Di­al, who al­so is pres­i­dent of the group, An­i­mals are Hu­man Too, de­scribes the amend­ments as they cur­rent­ly stand as “dis­ap­point­ing”, and sug­gests that an out­right ban on fire­works al­to­geth­er should be the way to go.

“Once the sale and use of fire­works can­not be mon­i­tored and reg­u­lat­ed to the point where the law can be en­forced, then the on­ly al­ter­na­tive is an out­right ban on fire­works be­ing sold pub­licly!” she stat­ed.

“As a phar­ma­cist I can re­late nu­mer­ous sto­ries of per­sons hav­ing to buy med­ica­tion, post-Di­vali and Old Years night, just from suf­fer­ing the af­ter­ef­fects of fire­works ex­plod­ing in their com­mu­ni­ties. Anx­i­ety, high blood pres­sure, strokes, heart at­tacks, and in­som­nia are just some of the dele­te­ri­ous ef­fects of fire­works to the health of hu­mans,” Nali­ni Di­al points out.

She added: “There have been nu­mer­ous in­ci­dents of per­sons suf­fer­ing in­juries from use of fire­works. In 2014, a po­lice­man and his fam­i­ly re­ceived burns when van­dals threw fire­works in­to a crowd at Di­vali cel­e­bra­tion. Then there was the in­ci­dent where a granny got her hands man­gled. And just re­cent­ly, this last 31st De­cem­ber 2021, sev­er­al homes were de­stroyed in Bel­mont, by fire, due to fire­works be­ing used by one per­son.”

She ar­gues that even as the cur­rent law con­cern­ing the use of fire­works ap­pears to be “use­less, in­ef­fec­tive, and be­ing to­tal­ly abused”, the Po­lice Ser­vice will not have an eas­i­er time try­ing to en­force the amend­ments pro­posed.

Nali­ni Di­al is con­cerned that pub­lic con­sul­ta­tion on the is­sue would on­ly de­lay the process of en­sur­ing good law is en­act­ed.

“There is al­so no need for any pub­lic con­sul­ta­tion since a JSC was held in 2017, and all stake­hold­ers have al­ready giv­en their pro­pos­als,” she said, “and yet to this date no af­fir­ma­tive ac­tion has been tak­en.

Notwith­stand­ing her dis­ap­point­ment, Ms Di­al says, “F.U.S is will­ing to dis­cuss with the AG our pro­pos­als and sug­ges­tions.”

The fol­low­ing are the key changes to the Fire­works Reg­u­la­tions un­der Sec­tion 99 of the Sum­ma­ry Of­fences Act (1921), which Gov­ern­ment has put out for pub­lic com­ment, and which Nali­ni Di­al main­tains must be re­viewed:

1. Fire­works can on­ly be dis­charged with­out a per­mit on pub­lic hol­i­days and De­cem­ber 31st.

2. On a pub­lic hol­i­day, fire­works can be dis­charged on­ly be­tween the hours of 8pm-9pm.

3. On De­cem­ber 31st fire­works can on­ly be dis­charged be­tween the hours of 11:30pm-1am.

4. A per­son shall not dis­charge fire­works with­in a half mile ra­dius of a hos­pi­tal, home for the el­der­ly, zoo, for­est re­serve, na­tion­al park or an­i­mal farm.

5. To dis­charge fire­works out­side of a pub­lic hol­i­day will re­quire a per­mit from the Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er.