The first day of the planned hunger strike by re­mand pris­on­ers from the Max­i­mum Se­cu­ri­ty Prison and the Port-of-Spain Prison fell through on Thurs­day as most of them failed to skip the re­spec­tive meals and in­stead ate.

How­ev­er, the sec­ond day, Fri­day, more re­mand pris­on­ers are ex­pect­ed to be­gin the planned in­def­i­nite hunger strike.

Fol­low­ing al­le­ga­tions made against prison and po­lice of­fi­cers of abuse of a “high-pro­file” pris­on­er, all re­mand­ed pris­on­ers de­cid­ed to go on a hunger strike from Thurs­day to high­light al­leged op­pres­sion dur­ing the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic.

Act­ing Com­mis­sion­er of Pris­ons, Den­nis Pul­chan said he hopes that “as time go on I ex­pect to see good sense to pre­vail and hope that they stop the non­sense as their ac­tion will not sway the Com­mis­sion­er of Pris­ons from his du­ties.”

Asked how the first day went, Pul­chan replied: “The num­ber of in­mates who start­ed this pass­ing of the prison di­et is rapid­ly de­creas­ing.”

An­oth­er prison source, who wished not to be iden­ti­fied al­leged that the pris­on­ers who re­fused their meals, “have re­al stocks in their vis­it bags in their cells.”

Guardian Me­dia was al­so told that no re­mand pris­on­ers from the Gold­en Grove Re­mand Yard and the Port-of-Spain Prison par­tic­i­pat­ed in the hunger strike on Thurs­day.

Ac­cord­ing to a state­ment dis­clos­ing the pro­posed hunger strike that was re­leased on Wednes­day via the so­cial me­dia plat­form, the pris­on­ers are call­ing for speedy tri­als for those ac­cused of mur­ders; rea­son­able bail for pet­ty of­fend­ers; the im­me­di­ate re­lease of all re­mand­ed in­mates from Build­ing 13 at the Max­i­mum Se­cu­ri­ty Prison (MSP); cloth­ing and med­ica­tion re­quests from their re­spec­tive fam­i­ly mem­bers and a full-scale in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to the al­leged gov­ern­ment in­volve­ment in ob­tain­ing and tor­tur­ing re­mand­ed pris­on­ers housed at build­ing 13 (MSP).

“It is al­ready a present sit­u­a­tion where re­mand­ed in­mates are be­ing held against their will with­out a tri­al date for as long as 15 to17 years on Re­mand. We are now faced with the COVID-19 virus…Prison of­fi­cers can­not en­sure the safe­ty of these re­mand­ed in­mates un­der these in­hu­mane con­di­tion's. Many are of the view that their lives are be­ing com­pro­mised and the dreams of be­ing free and re­unit­ing with their fam­i­lies are things that might nev­er be pos­si­ble. So we are ask­ing for a speedy tri­al or an im­me­di­ate re­sponse to the re­lease or dis­charge of all mur­der ac­cused from this in­fect­ed en­vi­ron­ment,” the state­ment read.

“ The im­me­di­ate re­lease of all re­mand­ed in­mates from Build­ing13 who are fac­ing hu­mil­i­a­tion and a high lev­el of op­pres­sion by the same po­lice of­fi­cers who charged and ac­cused these in­di­vid­u­als for crimes they did not com­mit…they are in­no­cent un­til proven guilty. We are well aware that some of the po­lice of­fi­cers and prison of­fi­cers who are present­ly as­signed by the com­mis­sion­er of po­lice are in­fect­ed by the Covid-19 and are cur­rent­ly jeop­ar­diz­ing the lives of these in­no­cent ac­cuse in­di­vid­u­als at Build­ing13,” it added.

The state­ment, which was be­lieved to have been pre­pared by a group of in­mates, claimed that Build­ing 13 is an “in­hu­mane en­closed en­vi­ron­ment per­fect for the breed­ing of the COVID-19.”

The T&T Prison Ser­vice, in an im­me­di­ate re­sponse, said that the state­ment re­flects the views of “a few dis­grun­tled pris­on­ers, some of whom, in March of this year, ri­ot­ed and de­stroyed an en­tire wing in the Re­mand prison as a re­sult of the same is­sues high­light­ed in their writ­ten mes­sage, name­ly COVID-19 trans­mis­sion and ex­ten­sive court de­lays.”

A COVID Com­mand Cen­tre has been set-up and is in op­er­a­tion, to man­age, record, mon­i­tor, eval­u­ate and aid in de­ci­sion mak­ing, for both staff and charges, ac­cord­ing to the pris­ons ser­vice.