Justice cannot be a masquerade for state violence.
Feminitt Caribbean Labour Day Statement.
Wednesday June 17th Kaia Sealy was arrested immediately on disembarking at Piarco Airport. She appeared before court that day , facing various charges levied against her in the police shooting of her partner Joshua Samaroo January 20th . The prosecutor for the State put forward the materials to be used in the charging of Kaia Sealy , including the request of an "intimate DNA sample". Over the last few months since the police shooting of Samaroo and the subsequent persecution of Kaia Sealy , protests have been organised that share shouts for justice, for restoring safety increasingly removed at the hands of the state.
Justice and safety in our current governance appears to mean stronger state policing. Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar recently debated in Parliament the extension of March 3rd June 17th State of Emergency [SoE] on the grounds of security reports highlighting "analyses of datasets related to all significant local and international threats to state security".
The concerns echoed by protesters are concerns for safety that are under threat by the very actors elected to maintain it . The current government's moves towards 'safety' have recently included pushing forward the Zone of Special Operations [ZOSO] Bill - rejected by Trinbago's Senate January 28th . This bill would have mandated military occupation of neighbourhoods , warrantless raids of civilian property and body at the whim of what the Prime Minister considers a "threat to the rule of law and public order". This phrase is taken directly from the ZOSO bill , yet paraphrases recent statements the Prime Minister has issued against protestors reclaiming justice for Samaroo's shooting at the hands of the police and the enabled persecution of his partner Kaia Sealy . It is interesting that , on the heels of the Senate rejection of the ZOSO Bill , the current government has worked a truly impressive about-turn to justify the extension of the SoE that allows similar freedoms - than the ZOSO Bill - to state executive and military forces while limiting those of its people.
Justice and safety cannot be manipulated for the protection and interests of state actors and bodies . There is no more state when civil voices are seen as a security threat . Justice and safety cannot be weapons redefined for the sake of justifying securing the state over securing the people .
It is damning that this long-held tension between civilian voices and current government's disconnected reality is being enacted to the detriment of the bodily rights and agency of Kaia Sealy . Wednesday June 17th an 'intimate DNA sample' was requested of her , refused by her legal team as this request had no relevance to the charges filed against her . The violence and threat of this request further highlights the depth of inequity of injustice in our communities . Women and menstruators are the first-hand victims of threats to safety in times of crisis . This is compounded when gender-based violence enters the limbs and policies of state powers. The recent murder of Mercedes Cabrera-Layne , a 12 year old child . Is another tragedy in an environment embedded with the multiple , lethal , harms of gender-based violence . Women and menstruators have been expected to move within systems , medical infrastructure that is inadequately bolstered to support our needs , where finding support and help from trauma is not guaranteed by the state . It is a further danger when the state not only continues to hold on to the systems that facilitate economic , emotional , physical GBV , but themselves replicate its physical forms.
The dangers of colonial hangovers festering in our institutions and political infrastructure are increasingly transparent in the escalating disconnect between communities and state bodies . The seemingly immovable bodies and systems weaponising existing violence in the name of the dismissed voice of our people inevitably replicate the same violence.
Feminitt continues to stand in our role in advancing gender justice in the Caribbean through on the ground work and advocacy in reproductive health and rights . This is work we do in teams , in communities . We move . Contact your MP . Support today's Labour Day Protest and Community Building activities in Fyzabad . Realising systems where care is the beginning and the center requires us , must focus on our voices.
Contact: feminitt@gmail.com
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