Submitted by Nathon J Green
No law if it conflicts with the rights of the citizens under the Constitution is legal.
When the ULP, its Left-wing politicians, and unions blocked the road during the Roadblock Revolution. Ambulances were denied permission to take citizens to Kingstown hospital. As a result, people were dying; babies were born in ambulances, citizens were denied the right to go about their civil rights and liberties as guaranteed under the Constitution.
Ralph Gonsalves is one man, a member of government and parliament, prime minister, and minister in charge of the police. He decries his being denied the right to enter parliament on foot on August 5.
Remember he was involved in the roadblock revolution? Did he or others consider the rights of the dying, the rights of the pregnant mothers? Being an intelligent man, I would be surprised if he didn’t. He considered he had the political right to bring society to a standstill, ignoring the constitutional rights of others and replacing those rights with his own actions, opinions and aims. What happened at the Roadblock Revolution was far worse than anything that recently occurred in Kingstown. The roadblock was unconstitutional, illegal, and morally wrong; it injured many people physically, mentally, and politically. It threatened the whole fabric of Vincentian democracy. Perhaps it was designed to do just that. Even if not, that is what it did.
On August 5, 2021, there was protest loud and rowdy protest by people, many of whom generally knew nothing of supposed laws restricting their gathering, meeting and considered it constitutionally correct to do so. For some, that protest was organised. For others, they joined it unplanned, and passers-by joined in because they agreed with the words of the protesters, the banners, the written posters. The protesters were from all factions of society and political parties, ULP and NDP members and supporters.
The police were obviously prepared for the demonstration, they had obviously been pre-informed if not by the NDP, certainly by their own intelligence that spies on every meeting, including private ones, that the NDP holds. They have been doing that for years reporting back their findings to political masters. They were fully prepared and expectant on the August 5, putting many crowd barriers up, having a large contingency of police officers on duty from every section of the force. The police were armed with batons, which they use on the day to beat people about the head with. They were prepared to lash out and injure the people, but unprepared to be able to protect Ralph Gonsalves when he decided to try and go walk about amidst an angry and furious crowd of demonstrators.
Following that day of protest, NDP members at the protest were raided at their homes by what are seen by many as political Police. The raid victimised, put recipients through a process of humiliation, inconvenience, and intimidation. It turned out to be a fishing trip by the Police, perhaps egged on by their political handlers.
I believe Police used illegally applied for search warrants that were worded in such a way to fool the authorising JP. Every one of the warrants had the reasons for searching the property as “firearms, ammunition, electronics” the Police had no reason or information that “firearms or ammunition” was suspected or believed to be at the places they raided. Of course, these matters may be even worse if the JP signing these warrants knew the reason for including “firearms and ammunition” in the wording of the search warrants and did not object but approved of the inclusion. The real raiding reasons being the gathering of electronics and analysing those people cell phones and laptops. If the magistrate or JP knew that, it would mean they also were part of political support of the action by the Police. An act that is most probably traceable right back to the ULP leadership, if just one person would be truthful instead of taking the forefront in telling multiple identifiable lies over the years. Over the last twenty years, hundreds of Vincentian citizens have had similar if not identically worded search warrants served on them.
Here is one from five years ago, I have more, for different people, all worded the same.
The only thing the police took was electronics and documents, which was the only thing they expected to find, the only things the wanted to find.
Should the police be pre-informed of organised meetings, rallies, protests, taking in public places. There is nothing wrong with that because they need to plan for Police to control situations and protect the public. But people should still have the right to instant non-organized sporadic protests. People must have the right of free assembly.
Unfortunately, the Police are defending their political masters, and they have chosen to side with a political party instead of the public.
There is no requirement or reason in our Constitutional law to get or obtain permission from anyone, including the Police, to hold a meeting, rally, or protest. Having to apply for permission is unconstitutional. If you apply, the Police will almost always say no, refuse permission, even ban such meetings from taking place. Those refusals and bans will almost always in SVG be politically motivated. They want to please their political masters. Banning such protests removes the right of the public to protest what they have a right to protest. Refusing and denying is used as a political tool, and for that reason only, the Police happily instigate and support that.
Protests by the people against what is happening in parliament are healthy and vital because it brings the politicians to notice the depth of feeling of the people or sections of the public on subjects and proposed changes in the law.
The rules and laws that demand that people or organisers get permission to hold a meeting in a public place are immoral and unconstitutional. They are designed to stop protests which are a God-given right of every human being.
Whatever this missile was thrown at Ralph Gonsalves outside parliament on August 5, was thrown by a man, an easily identifiable person. There is a video in the public domain. A news media member published the video. I analysed it frame by frame, and it is evident that the man lobbed a missile, this very missile. Yet the woman arrested for allegedly throwing the missile, in other parts of the same video had no hard object in hand or hands. She was probably detained because she was wearing a yellow NDP T-shirt. She is provably falsely accused, falsely arrested, coerced into making a false statement, coerced into making a false confession, and should be compensated, not prosecuted for something she did not do.
As reported by a politician who witnessed another chase and capture that day. The Police also chased and caught another woman and accused her of throwing the same missile that hit Gonsalves.
They had no idea at the time who threw the missile. The Police failed to protect Gonsalves from an angry crowd. They had to get their brownie points by arresting and prosecuting someone, perhaps not caring even if they have the right person.
The political situation and the control of the Police by politicians is a sour mixture. It has brought about police brutality and Police acting as political enforcers for the Unity Labour Party. The situation is dire. The citizens of SVG are in danger from the very people who should be protecting them.
Please, people in the region, hemisphere, and anyone who can help us, take in what is written here because it is a truthful account. We need help from our traditional allies, the UK, US, EU, UN.
We need your help. We are drowning in left-wing politics that has seen the people brought to a level of poverty that did not even exist at the time of emancipation. We are being stifled in our rights to protest. Protesters are being beaten with truncheons and batons. People are taken to police interview rooms and beaten to extract false confessions; it has been going on for twenty years. People turn up in court with pulped faces and black eyes.
PLEASE!
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