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By Halshane Burke
Prime Minister Andrew Holness has defended the reimposition of States of Public Emergency in areas where the measure recently expired.
The Prime Minister this morning announced a state of emergency in Clarendon, St. Catherine, St. James, Westmoreland, Hanover, and sections of Kingston and St. Andrew - all areas in which SOEs had been imposed for two weeks in November. The St. Andrew Central police division as well as the parish of St. Ann have been added to the new SOEs.
At a press conference on Tuesday morning, Mr. Holness said the measure is needed to clamp down on criminals who have increased their activities since the expiration of the first round of SOEs, and have threatened property and public disorder.
The Prime Minister said the regulations governing the States of Public Emergency have been modified in response to the judgment of the Constitutional Court in the Roshaine Clarke case.
The court, in June, ruled as unconstitutional the Emergency Powers Regulations under which Mr. Clarke was detained during a State of Public Emergency in St. James in 2018.
"The Emergency Powers Regulations that will be in effect for this new declaration of the SOEs are different from the regulations that the court took issue with. We have taken a lot of care and diligence to go through the various issues raised by the court and have made changes to address them," Mr. Holness sought to assure.
When questioned about whether the SOEs could be considered a routine crime fighting measure, the Prime Minister said the emergency powers are needed by the state to protect itself.
He argued that "there will always be SOEs", although the government would not want to use the measure "forever and ever and ever".
Mr. Holness said organised criminal violence is at a level which threatens the security and safety of every Jamaican, adding that the government will "need to upgrade and recraft how the emergency powers are used in our Constitution to deal with the modern threats that exist".
He insisted the government has improved how the SOEs are undertaken. He also noted that the government is building up the capacity of the security forces to respond to crime, without the abridging of rights that would normally apply in the use of the SOE.
Mr. Holness pointed out that other countries in the region have been implementing tougher security measures to fight rising crime. He again dismissed the critics of the SOEs, arguing that those who complain "are not the people who benefit from them in the communities where they have to hide under their beds, hide their daughters, can’t go to church and they see their sons and their boyfriends and husbands killed".
Murders reduced by SOEs
Police Commissioner Major General Antony Anderson, who also spoke at the press conference on Tuesday, said the murder rate was significantly reduced during the States of Public Emergency declared in November.
"At the end of the 14 day-period, the divisions where the States of Public Emergency were in effect recorded an overall 64 per cent decline in murders. That is 17 murders compared to 47 that were recorded 14 days prior," he shared.
He added that in the seven days since the end of those SOEs, there have been 22 murders nationally – 17 of which were in the areas where the SOEs had been declared.
General Anderson defended the measure, noting that when states of emergency are imposed, there is usually an immediate reduction in murders.
For instance, in the first 10 days of the last SOEs, he said there was one murder recorded "from the border of Manchester and Clarendon, through Clarendon, St. Catherine, St. Andrew South, Kingston West, Kingston Central, Kingston East to the border of St. Thomas".
There were three consecutive days - November 8, 9, and 10 - where no murder was recorded.
"The last time such a trend was recorded was in 2012," General Anderson declared, adding that murders nationally were reduced by 46 per cent over the 14-day period.
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