Siparia MP Kamla Persad-Bissessar on Saturday condemned the action by police Friday that led to the arrest of prominent trade unionist David Abdullah.Police arrested Abdullah Friday afternoon during an anti-tax demonstration outside the Red House in Port of Spain while legislators were debating the proposed new property tax.
The People's Democracy demonstration was one of two protests in the city Friday, both of which focused on the controversial tax.
Read the story: Police arrest union boss David Abdullah during anti-tax protest
The Siparia MP said the vocal demonstrations echoed the rejection of the tax. And she condemned what she called police brutality, adding that the attack on citizens violated their rights.
"We live in a democracy. We must have freedom of expression and that expression includes freedom of association whether it is to move protest action. I saw them yesterday, they were peacefully marching around the Red House," she said.
She wondered what could have caused such behaviour from police and suggested they behaved as if they were agents of the PNM.
Persad-Bissessar warned that what happened Friday is most unfortunate and shows the extent to which the Manning administration will go to stifle citizens' views on property tax.
And she suggested that if this hostility to citizens continue "there will be more protest action in this country and that could escalate and we do not want it to go there. The Government needs to do a reality check."
She warned that the Property Tax is a measure aimed at pauperising the public, calling the measure an extreme form of oppression that affects the poor, the working poor and the middle class. "Everybody on a fixed income is going to be hit," she said.
Earlier this week the former attorney general, who is campaigning for the leadership of the United National Congress (UNC), told supporters that one of her first acts if she becomes prime minister of Trinidad and Tobago would be scrap the tax.
2 comments:
The present regime is so corrupt that anyone who stands up and demand accountability would be crushed, this is the only way for the squander and corruption to continue. But this is all possible because of a blind few who continue to re-elect a govnt that has done nothing to improve their lives, then there are those who say the the PNM is the lesser of the evils and preach about empowerment - madness I say, then there are those who ask "who we go put" all this is their way of justifying their blind loyalty for electing a govnt that looks like them.
I agree with Marlon completely.
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