By Sue-Ann Wayow
TO allow police officers to enter private property and advise citizens as to what they can and cannot do will be a direct infringement on citizens’ rights.
And this will also open the door for abuse of authority.
This is according to the Law Association of Trinidad and Tobago (LATT) who stated in a press release on Friday that based on the current Constitution, there are no regulations governing conduct on private property.
On Thursday, Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley in laying out new Covid-19 measures which included the closure of bars, restaurants, places of worship and entertainment, also said that police can intervene on private property if certain regulations such as limit on crowd gathering were being breached.
The Prime Minister seemed to refer to intended engagement of purported powers under the Public Health Ordinance of 1940, LATT stated.
It stated, “Yesterday, and with all due respect, without making a reasonable link between the conduct of citizens on private property and the rise in numbers, the Honourable Prime Minister seemed to refer to intended engagement of purported powers under the Public Health Ordinance 1940.”
LATT stated, “The ordinance permits the entry on private property only for particular purposes inspection, doing sanitary work and so on. The clear intention of the legislation is to allow authorities to enter ‘infected’ premises to inspect, sanitise and do whatever else may be necessary. The ordinance also seems to circumscribe this power by suggesting its exercise must be endorsed by a magistrate.
“We remind our members and members of the public that there are no regulations governing conduct on private property in terms of numbers of people who may be there, masks and social distancing. No issue of enforcement on private property therefore arises. Indeed, it is likely that in light of our constitutional protections, no regulations can be made to regulate conduct on private property,” LATT stated.
It added, “The association is of the view that to use the ordinance in these circumstances to permit entry to private property will be illegal. It opens the door too easily to an abuse of power and breaches of constitutional rights.
“The militarised face of the TTPS which is the one which regrettably we have come to know over the past few years is not one to be shown to children in their homes and safe spaces and citizens who have been traumatised at multiple levels by this pandemic.”
The association is instead encouraging responsible behaviour from the entire population.
