Opposition leader Kamla Persad-Bissessar is calling on Minister of National Security Stuart Young to answer about the border control police and rules of exemption which have been leaving citizens stranded abroad.
Speaking at Monday night’s United National Congress (UNC) virtual campaign meeting, Persad-Bissessar said she has information that senior immigration officers have been blocked from using the computer systems while junior and complicit ones are granted access.
“Immigration access to computers have been locked out. Several senior people locked out. Who else is coming here that we don’t know about?” Persad-Bissessar asked.
“Stuart, the truth will always come out,” she said.
She said the current exemption policy favours some more than others.
Persad-Bissessar also said that there is no law which gives Young the power to determine who can come in and who cannot.
“Where do you get the power? From under which law you have the power to stop a citizen to come home?” Persad-Bissessar asked.
“Is it true that once you land here you must get in?” she said.
Persad-Bissessar said that she is being told that people are coming in on flights with no exemption and cannot be stopped.
“Some few have contacts complicit with others, they board an aircraft and come in,” she said.
“We are told now you are booking flights and airlines getting exemptions from you,” she added.
Persad-Bissessar recalled last year’s visit by Venezuelan vice-president Delcy Rodriguez during the border lockdown and questioned what Rodriguez brought into the country.
She said people want the UNC to stay quiet when the country was “being robbed” by the Government.
“Well I am done being nice,” she said.
Persad-Bissessar also brought up the current Procurement Legislation.
She said the Government removed medical services from scrutiny.
She said that the Attorney General Faris Al-Rawi has such close links to the medical sector that he had to recuse himself from some medical decisions.
“Why remove medical services?” she said.
“They playing footsie with the people money,” she said.
She called on the voters to use the upcoming by-elections to say no to coming property tax and no to gutting the procurement legislation.
“When we thought right-thinking people would have said no to this legislation... it have some people who vote for this,” she said.
Persad-Bissessar questioned whether anyone who voted for the legislation is linked to the Government in any way.
“Time will tell and time longer than twine,” she said.