Public Must Work with Police During State of Emergency

Chester Williams

The provisions within the statutory instrument governing the national state of emergency are still unclear for some persons, particularly where it concerns their movement during non-curfew hours.  The primary responsibility of law enforcement during this period is to ensure that the citizenry remains honest about its comings and goings.  There’s an appeal for members of the public to be cooperative with officers who will be asking questions about their whereabouts and movement.  In so doing, ComPol Williams spoke to various areas of the statutory instrument to provide clarity.

Chester Williams, Commissioner of Police

“At the end of the day, we don’t want to be deceived by persons who may be out for one reason and give us a totally different reason for being out.  So police will stop you and question you and I do ask that if and when that occurs that you just work with the police.  At the end of the day whatever is being done is to ensure the safety of each and every one of us.  Now in terms of the business places that are open during the non-curfew period, there are a number of them and the AG had gone through the list extensively and explained basically what those businesses are and while they are permitted to be open they still need to ensure that they comply with the social distance regulation in that the regulation provides that the employer or establishment owner can determine the number of persons that are allowed to be on the premises at any given time.  I know that for today there have been a number of businesses that were opened that do not fall within the scope of the regulations and we have been around closing down some of those establishments that we know do not fall within the regulations.  Now, we need to look also at the issue as it relates to the persons who are at home.  You know, as we say to people, you must stay home.  The best remedy is for you to stay home.  Some might say, but do we need to be locked up in our homes or cane we come out?  Yes, you can come out of your house, you can be in your yard.  You can do whatever you want to do in your yard, but you cannot allow more than ten persons to congregate in your yard if anyone of those persons are not from your household.  So if it is that twenty of you are from that household, then twenty of you can congregate, but no person from outside shall be allowed to be on your premises.”