By Sue-Ann Wayow
IF a prime minister is privy to any information regarding the operations of the Police Service Commission (PolSC), he should ensure that the Commission was informed of such information.
This was the declaration of Dr Rowley on Wednesday as he wound up the motion to approve the five new commissioners of the PolSC.
The commissioners who were nominated by President Paula-Mae Weekes have all been selected via a voting process in the House of Representatives.
The new commissioners are Judith Jones, Ian Ramdhanie, Maxine Attong, Maxine King and Rajiv Persad.
The 21 government members voted for while the 19 Opposition members voted against citing a flawed process. Absent from the voting process was Member of Parliament for Arouca/Maloney, Camille Robinson-Regis.
Dr Rowley lambasted the Opposition for “playing the victim” and fabricating lies surrounding the entire PolSC imbroglio misleading the public with misinformation.
He referred to two questions that were asked by President Weekes and asked that the public pay close attention to them.
The first was should a commission be left in the dark if there was a leak in information that is pertinent to the commission’s operations?
And, “If the Commission is to be informed by whom?”
Dr Rowley added, “By what process?”
He said according to the Constitution, the PolSC should ask the commissioner of police every six months to submit a report and the commission shall have the power to call the commissioner o produce documents.
He read, “… the Police Service Commission may on its own initiative request a special report from the Commissioner of Police at any time on any matter relating to the management of the police service which the Commissioner of Police will respond in a timely manner.”
Dr Rowley said he interpreted that statement to mean that at any time, the PolSC can ask the CoP about anything.
“If as Prime Minister, I find myself in a situation with information that is pertinent to any commission conducting its business, I will not hesitate to pass that information unto the commission,” Dr Rowley said.
Last month, Dr Rowley said he had written to the then police service commission a year before to say that he had lost confidence in then police commissioner Gary Griffith.
