An­drea Perez-Sobers

Se­nior Re­porter

an­drea.perez-sobers@guardian.co.tt

“A witch-hunt” is how se­cu­ri­ty con­sul­tant and re­tired T&T De­fence Force major Dirk Barnes de­scribes the ar­rest and the re­lease of Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice Er­la Hare­wood-Christo­pher.

She was ar­rest­ed last Thurs­day in con­nec­tion with the on­go­ing probe in­to the pro­cure­ment of two high-pow­ered ri­fles.

Barnes told Guardian Me­dia that with his un­der­stand­ing of the pro­cure­ment process and what is be­ing put for­ward in the me­dia, some­thing is not adding up.

“This is just mere­ly a witch-hunt for some­thing, or some­body is not in­ter­pret­ing the Firearms Act prop­er­ly,” Barnes added.

The Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er was re­leased at 6 pm last evening, and in an up­dat­ed in­ter­view, Barnes chuck­led and said, “I told you it was a witch-hunt.”

He out­lined that the Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions (DPP) Roger Gas­pard was look­ing at the in­for­ma­tion that was be­fore him and not see­ing an of­fence or not see­ing an of­fence that could lead to a con­vic­tion.

“Not see­ing ev­i­dence that can lead to a con­vic­tion, they would have reached the point where they could de­tain them no longer and have to re­lease them, or they could very well be re-ar­rest­ed on fur­ther in­for­ma­tion or if they gath­er fur­ther in­for­ma­tion that sup­ports go­ing back be­fore the DPP,” he said.

How­ev­er, he said with Com­mis­sion­er Hare­wood-Christo­pher and for­mer di­rec­tor of the SSA re­tired Ma­jor Roger Best not be­ing charged, it means that the po­lice ser­vice did not have enough ev­i­dence to ar­rest.

Fur­ther, Barnes said, what the com­mis­sion­er did by sign­ing off on the two high-pow­ered weapons for the SSA did not equate to an of­fence un­less she was tak­ing mon­ey, be­ing bribed, or part of some kind of con­spir­a­cy to bring down the Gov­ern­ment.

He said the en­tire na­tion was put in an un­easy po­si­tion, and the pub­lic must de­mand an­swers.

Mean­while, re­gion­al se­cu­ri­ty ex­pert Garvin Heer­ah said the re­lease of Hare­wood-Christo­pher and Best ex­hib­it­ed the need for thor­ough and metic­u­lous over­sight. “De­tails to which I be­lieve are be­ing ac­cu­mu­lat­ed. The next steps are go­ing to be crit­i­cal to na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty in­tegri­ty,” he added.

He fur­ther stat­ed that the pro­cure­ment of weapons for the TTPS and Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty agen­cies re­quires strict due dili­gence, in­volv­ing checks and bal­ances and ad­her­ence to le­gal pro­to­cols.

Heer­ah not­ed that trans­paren­cy and ac­count­abil­i­ty are para­mount, with sig­na­ture au­thor­i­ties and ap­proval process­es en­sur­ing prop­er over­sight of the pro­cure­ment of weapons.

Heer­ah high­light­ed that in any in­ves­ti­ga­tion, the crit­i­cal ques­tion re­mains—were these safe­guards fol­lowed, or was pub­lic trust com­pro­mised? He said the ar­rest had sent shock­waves through the re­gion.

Ac­cord­ing to Heer­ah, this de­vel­op­ment which is un­fold­ing against the back­drop of a de­clared State of Emer­gency (SoE), po­lit­i­cal tran­si­tions, and in­ten­si­fy­ing na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty con­cerns, had sig­nif­i­cant­ly im­pact­ed the coun­try’s gov­er­nance, pub­lic con­fi­dence, and in­ter­na­tion­al rep­u­ta­tion.

Be­fore Hare­wood-Christo­pher was re­leased, the re­gion­al se­cu­ri­ty ex­pert said in a re­lease, “In times of cri­sis, swift and de­ci­sive lead­er­ship is para­mount. The im­me­di­ate in­stal­la­tion of an Act­ing Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice (Ag CoP) is not just a pro­ce­dur­al ne­ces­si­ty but a strate­gic im­per­a­tive to main­tain or­der, op­er­a­tional sta­bil­i­ty, and pub­lic trust.”

He added that the TTPS must com­mu­ni­cate a firm and un­wa­ver­ing com­mit­ment to trans­paren­cy, ac­count­abil­i­ty and re­silience in the face of ad­ver­si­ty.

“Lead­er­ship un­der these con­di­tions must be strong, res­olute, and ca­pa­ble of steer­ing the TTPS through this pe­ri­od of un­cer­tain­ty with con­fi­dence and strate­gic fore­sight,” Heer­ah said.