The
Office of the Honourable Prime Minister of TT
Through
The
Office of the Honourable Attorney General
Through
The Office of Law Revision Commission
Dear
Honourable Dr. Rowley,
AN
OPEN LETTER ON POLICY CHANGE
I
wish to commend your government for maintaining the status of Trinidad and
Tobago as a High
Human Development Index country, along with most Caribbean countries, according
to the annual ranking of the UNNDP. I hope that you will increase the rate of
development, say in the area of gender equality, to help TT to join the Very
High Human Development Index countries soon. I also hope that you will share
your secrets to success with African countries that continue to hug the Low
Human Development Index ranks with a few exceptions.
I
worked at UWI St. Augustine from 2006 to 2009 as a Professor of Sociology.
During that time, I was fortunate to receive a government of Trinidad and
Tobago researcher-initiated grant to study the ‘Causes of Crime in the Country,
the Region and Globally’. The major activities were mentoring junior
researchers, the formation of the Caribbean Criminology Network across the
three campuses of UWI, and the hosting of an international conference on the
theme of Developing a Caribbean Criminology.
I
am writing to share one of the policy implications of the findings that you may
wish to consider to help the country and the region to reduce the high rates of
violent crime and serve as a shining model to other developing countries and
regions. Similar policy recommendations have already been published and so you
may already be familiar with them but I am using this opportunity to urge you
to summon the political will and courage to implement them at little or no cost
for the benefit of the people.
In
April 2016 The
Honourable Faris Al-Rawi, the Attorney General of TT, told The Guardian Newspaper
that in Trinidad and Tobago, “A remand cell has nine people in it, four of whom are in for
charges of murder and the rest there for possession of two joints of marijuana.
They share the cell for two and three years and then you have to ask yourself
if you are encouraging recidivism or criminality by association.”
From the statistics that he
cited, it can be estimated that marijuana remand prisoners cost the government 75
million dollars annually for remand prisoners alone. Given that criminologists
have for a long time validated the theory of
differential association by Edwin Sutherland according to whom criminality
is learned through association with other criminals, the detention of
nonviolent drug users and other petty offenders with violent offenders could
only lead to the petty offenders becoming more violent when released.
The government can change
this overnight by instructing the Law Revision Commission to immediately
reclassify marijuana as a legal substance to be regulated in the same way as
tobacco and alcohol which kill lots of people every year while marijuana has
never killed anyone.
We educators can be relied
upon to teach young people to say no to all drugs and when they suffer any
adverse effects, the hospitals will help to reduce the harm without involving
the criminal justice system as is the case with the much more dangerous tobacco
and alcohol.
Besides, doctors are
willing to recommend marijuana for medicinal uses to patients and so the
government should allow this option to be exercised legally instead of forcing
patients to patronize drug gangs. Raffique
Shah wrote a passionate plea in The
Express of March 13, 2017 seeking permission to be allowed to use
cannabis oil to treat his Parkinson’s disease.
As you may already know, Jamaica
has taken the lead in the region by decriminalizing the medical uses of
marijuana. Trinidad and Tobago can afford to take a step further by legalizing
it for recreational purposes and regulating it to ensure that underage children
are not able to purchase it from licensed dealers contrary to the current
situation where anyone can buy from dealers who do not check the age of the
buyers.
The only ones benefiting
from keeping marijuana illegal are the drug gangs and they will be forced out
of business by legitimate dealers who would be licensed and who would pay taxes
on their sales to generate more revenues. Other products could also be
manufactured from hemp to help diversify the economy.
The government will also
save money from ending unnecessary prosecutions by directing police officers to
cease and desist from going after non-violent marijuana users. This move will
earn police officers more respect and love in the community and they may no
longer be called Babylon. Instead, more ladies will wine on them during
carnival.
This policy has bipartisan
support with Mr.
Basdeo Panday once expressing his support for re-legalization since he remembered
when sugar cane field workers were paid part of their wages with marijuana
during the colonial days. Dr. Peter Hanoomansingh
supports this with evidence from his doctoral dissertation in History.
Internationally, South
Africa and Israel
have decriminalized medical marijuana this year with huge business potentials,
the Italian
army is authorized to grow medical marijuana and supply to hospitals, eight
states and the District of Columbia in the US have voted to legalize it for
recreational uses and 26 states have authorized the use of medical marijuana, Portugal
has decriminalized all drugs since 1997 and The
Netherlands has been experimenting with legalized marijuana sales in coffee
shops since 1976. Uruguay
recently legalized marijuana for recreational uses.
If the government is
afraid of the electoral consequences of legalization, then call a referendum on
the policy and let the people decide. Otherwise, encourage a bipartisan bill to
be presented in parliament for legalization. Or encourage citizens to sue the
government for the deprivation of liberty and let the courts decide. The more
courageous move would be for the Honourable Prime Minister to lead the policy
change with an immediate directive to the Law Revision Commission to reclassify
marijuana as a legal substance.
Since the law against
marijuana was imposed by colonial officials without justification, it is time
for Trinidad and Tobago to echo the mantra of the founding father, Dr. Eric
Williams, by telling the people that Massa
Day Done so that law abiding adults can use their freedom to decide what to
consume without posing a threat to themselves or to others in a democratic
society.
Yours truly,
Dr. Onwubiko Agozino
Professor of Sociology and
Africana Studies
Virginia Tech
Blacksburg
VA 24061
USA
540-231-7699
CC:
Omatie Lyder, editor
in chief, Express: omatie.lyder@trinidadexpress.com
Fazeer Mohammed, host
of Morning Edition, TV6: fazeer2001@gmail.com
Jones P. Madeira,
editor in chief of Newsday: jones.madeira@gmail.com
Anthony Wilson, EIC,
Guardian: anthony.wilson@guardian.co.tt
Carisa Lee, producer
of The Morning Brew: lee.ccarisa@mail.com
Joshua Seemungal,
reporter, TV6: jseem001@fiu.edu
Satesha Mahabir: satesh@cnc3.co.tt
Varun Bhagerty, CNMG: varun@cnmg.tt
Sandra Maharaj, CNMG: smaharaj@cnmg.tt
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