SELECTIVE JUSTICE’: NO CHARGES FOR BAKR

By JON DRAPER 

WHILE the authorities in the United States have charged almost 100 planned insurrectionists in the January 6 debacle, there is no police probe in Trinidad and Tobago into Yasin Abu Bakr’s volatile comments. 

“I am warning the Government,” Bakr said in a recent freewheeling video recording. 

“I am warning everybody who is involved in the repression of African people; I am warning you.  

“This is your last warning.” 

In spite of the inflammatory remarks, the Police Service has revealed that there is no investigation into the architect of the deadly 1990 failed coup. 

But law enforcement had raided the religious radio station operated by Hindu leader Sat Maharaj in 2019 and charged him with sedition, an offense related to the attempted overthrow of a Government. 

Trade unionist Watson Duke was also pressed with sedition charges. 

The charges against Maharaj and Duke arose from separate public pronouncements. 

In the US, charges have been laid against people who staged a violent attack on the Capitol Building in January, in an attempt to illegally alter the presidential election results. 

One prominent attorney described the lack of police interest in Bakr’s outburst as “selective justice”, adding that “the society should be concerned with such threats from someone who staged a terrorist attack against an elected administration.” 

He added: “It is difficult to reconcile the lack of police investigation with their aggression against Maharaj and Duke.” 

At least 24 people died and there were multi-million-dollar property wreckage and looting in the 1990 attempted insurrection.