IN a striking statement, Chief Secretary Farley Augustine claims Tobago's key police officials are politically aligned with the PNM and are specifically intent on dismantling the current administration of the Tobago House of Assembly (THA.)

During an emergency sitting of the assembly on Wednesday morning, Augustine said, “But when the police officers go to work with balisier under their khaki suits, or when the laws and mechanisms for choosing a leader of the TTPS forces prospective leaders to kiss the royal behinds of the sitting prime minister, simply non-illegal concepts will become criminalised for the sole purpose of distressing those who have a different political point of view from those in power.”

He accused the police of criminalising all actions that support his party.

“Trinidad and Tobago, we are treading on very dangerous grounds.

"It is on the most undemocratic of principles, where government and the country cannot peacefully facilitate dissenting voices or point of views."

He said democracy meant one should have a right even to be noisy "in objection to the government of the day without fear of political persecution.

"Madam Presiding Officer, there is prosecution and then there is persecution. What is happening in Tobago at this very hour is persecution.”

He described the searches recently carried out at his home, the home of Deputy Chief Secretary Dr Faith B Yisrael and a former chief administrator as “lazy copy and paste” and “sloppy work by the TTPS.”

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