Panday criticises attacks on independent senators

Po­lit­i­cal Leader of the Pa­tri­ot­ic Front, Mick­ela Pan­day, has crit­i­cised com­ments made by Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar ahead of to­day’s Sen­ate de­bate on the Zones of Spe­cial Op­er­a­tions (ZOSO) leg­is­la­tion, de­scrib­ing the ap­proach as ar­ro­gant and dis­mis­sive of the State’s re­spon­si­bil­i­ty to cit­i­zens.

In a Face­book post, Pan­day wrote, “This is not lead­er­ship. It is ar­ro­gance,” adding that, “No Prime Min­is­ter has the right to tell cit­i­zens, ac­cept our laws or fend for your­selves against crim­i­nals.”

Yes­ter­day, it was re­port­ed that Per­sad-Bisses­sar said she would not be sur­prised if In­de­pen­dent Sen­a­tors vote against the ZOSO leg­is­la­tion when it comes be­fore the Sen­ate to­day. The bill was passed in the House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives last Fri­day with­out op­po­si­tion sup­port and now re­quires the back­ing of at least four of the nine In­de­pen­dent Sen­a­tors to se­cure pas­sage in the Up­per House.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar was al­so quot­ed as say­ing that Pres­i­dent Chris­tine Kan­ga­loo was a PNM mem­ber and that “in­de­pen­dent” sen­a­tors were not in­de­pen­dent, as they are ap­point­ed by the Pres­i­dent.

Against that back­ground, Pan­day ar­gued that pub­lic safe­ty could not be treat­ed as lever­age. “Pub­lic safe­ty is not a bar­gain­ing chip, and it is not con­di­tion­al on obe­di­ence,” she wrote, adding that the State’s du­ty to pro­tect ap­plied “to every com­mu­ni­ty, not on­ly those that fall in line.”

She said In­de­pen­dent Sen­a­tors were open to scruti­ny but re­ject­ed what she de­scribed as a con­temp­tu­ous pos­ture to­wards them. “In­de­pen­dent Sen­a­tors are not be­yond crit­i­cism. They are not elect­ed, and their role must be ex­am­ined hon­est­ly,” Pan­day wrote, adding that, “the an­swer is not con­tempt, it is re­form.” She said that if their in­flu­ence was so con­se­quen­tial, “con­sti­tu­tion­al re­form must be placed square­ly on the leg­isla­tive agen­da.”

Pan­day said the wider is­sue ex­posed a gov­ern­ing ap­proach that con­fused au­thor­i­ty with en­ti­tle­ment. “What is re­al­ly be­ing ex­posed here is a gov­ern­ment that mis­takes pow­er for en­ti­tle­ment,” she wrote, adding that laws which ex­pand state au­thor­i­ty must earn le­git­i­ma­cy. “They are not im­posed by brava­do, nor passed by dar­ing cit­i­zens to re­sist.”

She end­ed by call­ing for a dif­fer­ent stan­dard of lead­er­ship, writ­ing, “Our coun­try does not need bul­ly­ing or con­tempt. We need se­ri­ous re­form, con­sti­tu­tion­al clar­i­ty and lead­er­ship that un­der­stands it gov­erns for the peo­ple, not over them.”