“This is a democratic state and changing constitutional law that will infringe on the human rights of people, is not a decision left in your hands.”
Those were the words yesterday of stakeholders to Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley, in response to his suggestion that Government may make vaccines mandatory if a more virulent strain of COVID-19 hits T&T.
In a telephone interview, attorney Brian Baig said,“This can’t happen. We are still a democratic country; we are still a democratic state. We must never forget that we have had countries in the world that trampled on the rights of citizens. And we cannot operate like them. We are still a democratic nation with an elected government. We have a democracy in Trinidad and Tobago. This is not a dictatorship.”
Currently, France has taken a position to make vaccination mandatory only for healthcare workers. A Houston Chronicle article dated June 22 also said over 150 healthcare workers at the Houston Methodist Baytown Hospital were either fired while others resigned over the hospital’s recent policy mandating vaccination.
Agreeing that vaccinations were important, Baig said at the same time, the Government should never use its office or power to trample on the civil liberties of society.
“Persons should still be given the right to choose. And where do we go from here? If a person chooses to not take the vaccine, are we going to have to label them as unvaccinated people, as what was done in Germany, where the Jews were made to walk around with the sign on their arms?”
Baig said instead of the Government’s big stick approach with its Vaccinate to Operate policy, it should seek to do consultations with the public, as fear was now gripping citizens who are worried about becoming unemployed if they are not vaccinated.
“The Government should think long and hard about this. What are you going to do, put people on the breadline because they did not take a vaccine? This is wrong, you can’t do that!” he said.
Baig said making the vaccine mandatory would also infringe on other rights such as medical confidentiality and even one’s right to live.
“Imagine a person who has a medical condition that prevents them from taking the vaccine. What happens there? Are they going to have to walk with a letter everywhere they go saying what’s wrong with them, even if that health issue is a very private one? More importantly, if a person is forced to take a vaccine and something happens to them and they fall ill because of this vaccine, who are we holding liable after that after you force them? he asked.
Another lawyer who spoke anonymously with Guardian Media, said for such a law to be made mandatory, it would take constitutional reform and even that was no ready-made process, as creating or passing a law that would alter or breach the human rights of citizens would require a three-fifths majority in both houses of the Parliament.
“That requires a motion to be filed, a bill to be tabled and a debate, showing all the scientific facts and all the proven and un-proven facts, and so on. So it’s not an overnight thing,” the lawyer explained.
But attorneys Jonathan Bhagan and Aidan Chin Aleong said while mandatory vaccinations would generally violate section 4 of the Constitution, with a State of Emergency (SoE) still intact, Rowley’s brave statement could mean plans to use Sections 6, 7, and 13 of the Constitution to justify in this instance, exceptions to the law that speak to the human rights and freedoms of citizens in Sections 4 and 5.
They were spot on, as in a social media post late yesterday, attorney and ex-Opposition senator Larry Lalla, after explaining that under the Public Health Act vaccinations have been a norm from the pre-school stage, wrote: “It should not be difficult, bearing in mind that we are in a pandemic and the Government has wide powers under the Public Health Ordinance to act to protect the public against COVID-19.”
He said the Government can add COVID-19 to that list and make vaccination mandatory “for our presence at workplaces and public buildings et cetera.”
Responding to Lalla’s comment, Aleong warned that this “loophole” for the Government to flex its power can open a dangerous can of worms.
“I believe that it will open a can of worms, snakes and other undesirables, because those who sacrifice freedom for the sake of safety will have neither. It would reduce our Constitution to a series of legal obstacles for which any apparent emergency can be exploited to manipulate it,” he explained.
Meanwhile, one trade union and a political party have made their stance clear.
The Joint Trade Union Movement (JTUM), in a statement, said, “Our position is that whilst we advise our members to access the vaccine, we are vehemently opposed to mandatory vaccination in all forms for any reason.”
Stating that Rowley’s Vaccinate to Operate policy was ill-advised, the leader of the Movement for Social Justice (MSJ) David Abdulah said, “It must be stated that there is no law that makes it compulsory for a person to be vaccinated. To force a worker to be vaccinated is, in our view, also illegal.”
