Setting up Bakr as terrorist fall guy
... will it solve TnT's problems?

NO one would be surprised that by the time the Anti -Terrorism Bill is passed in the Senate and becomes law, if Yasin Abu Bakr will be the first target.

Indeed, if you look at how things have been unravelling in the past few months it would be easy to figure out that the stage is being set for someone to get rid of the man who led the July 1990 attempted coup in the country.

And while he has been at the forefront of the call for an inquiry into the six-day siege of the Red House in which former Prime Minister A.N.R. Robinson and some of his colleagues were kept hostage, no one has paid him mind.

Now this scribe cannot write in defence of the Imam; obviously he has enough lyrics and lawyers to accomplish that.

Sadly, however, whenever we talk of terrorism in this country the blinkered politicians do not see beyond Bakr, which leaves all of us exposed to the real threats that are out there and can strike at any unguarded moment.

It makes me wonder whether the charade is aimed at the Imam and his Mucurapo Mosque.

Now, ever since the coup attempt politicians have courted Bakr shamelessly and now, suddenly and perhaps conveniently he has turned into a liability.

And that is why I honestly believe that the attempted murder charge, which they were unable to pin on him after the jury was split on the verdict, was just the beginning of several attempts to get the Imam.

And as time unfolds, we will know whether and how the United States will; be involved and is effectively pushing the buttons for the locals to act.

The foundation is being laid.

Now that he's free after the trial for the attempted murder of Salim Rashid and Zaki Obadiah (his son-in-law) -- until a retrial is ordered -- there is no doubt that the powers-that-be will accelerate the steps towards Bakr.

The trial was barely completed in Port of Spain, when the scene shifted to Miami where former Muslimeen frontliner, Olive Enyahoma-El, who was set up in a sting operation in which he allegedly went to illegally buy arms for Trinidad, was found guilty in a really speedy trial.

Figuring prominently in that trial was the Jamaat al Muslimeen, which, once again was portrayed as a local terrorist cell, with international connections.

Now people have been putting that tag on the Jamaat for a long time, whether deserved or not, but neither the Imam nor his followers would deny that in this rounds it is more serious.

Was the stage being set for the next move on the Jamaat?

And that is mainly because of the anti-terrorism legislation that is now being pushed through Parliament, its precedent being the US Patriot Act which was rushed through the Congress in the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 attacks in New York and Washington.

How come our politicians are so blinkered that anytime they talk terrorism they can only see the Imam's face?

Haven't we moved forward with real security concerns?
Like, for example, because of the expansion of the energy sector this country could become an easy target for international terrorists.

And that includes the dreaded Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), which could very well use Trinidad as the doorstep to doing its dirty work in Venezuela.

The USA can easily black-mail the TnT government saying that they encourage terrorists and cause the government to move on Bakr, or allow the US to move on him or use our soil to do anything that they need to do.

The war on terrorism, this columnist has often contended, is designed to introduce global policing without borders in a way that it has never functioned before.

On an international level, one analyst notes that "the Anti-Terrorism Act of 2001" is almost unbelievable in the degree to which it will turn the USA into a full-scale police state.

"Terrorism is very loosely and broadly defined, and life imprisonment is authorised for any offense which comes under this definition.

"The bill is retroactive and there is no statue of limitations.

"This means that people who were activists back in the 1960s or 1970s could be imprisoned for life, if their acts in the past could be construed as "terrorism" under this new police-state bill.

"Even those who merely attended the demonstrations, or helped plan them, could be punished equally with those who actually committed the acts.

"Broad new powers of surveillance, preventive detention, and searches of homes without warrants are included in the police-state bill.

"Even minor computer hacking would be "terrorism" and would be punishable by life imprisonment.

"And there many, many other equally frightening provisions.

"Nearly every country in the third world has some local ethnic group which is struggling against some kind of dictatorial government, usually installed by the USA.

"Every one of these ethnic groups can be labelled 'terrorist'.

Thus Bush can always intervene anywhere he wants for whatever reason and call it part of the "War on Terrorism".

"In the Middle East, Balkans, and Western Asia, the US will continue the process of turning much of the region into an occupied imperialist realm, as we now see in Kosovo. Afghanistan occupies a very strategic geopolitical position, and military bases there will be important in the coming confrontation with China.

"Vast reserves of oil remain in that region, along with other minerals, and control over these resources will be critical as global supplies become increasingly scarce.

"In particular, Afghanistan is the planned route for a pipeline to transport huge Caspian Sea oil reserves to Western markets.

"US dominance of the NATO agenda will be important in this region, as will the careful management of European public opinion.

"One should not be surprised if US intelligence agencies covertly arrange for terrorist attacks in Europe along the same lines as the WTC attacks.

"Even without covert US encouragement, one can expect terrorist responses to the indiscriminate US bombing unleashed in Afghanistan and who-knows-where-else.

"Any such terrorist attacks will galvanise Western public opinion further, adding depth to Bush's blank check.

"Already Greenpeace and many other progressive organisations are categorised as 'terrorist' in the FBI lexicon.

"And it is the anti-globalisation movement, which includes such organisations, which is the real threat to the global capitalist elite.

"With a blank check to dominate the globe militarily, and to suppress the American people in the name of 'security', there seems to be little to stand in the way of George Bush Junior, years after his father announced the New World Order."

Here in the local context Bakr falls into the mix nicely, and could be used either way by the powers-that-be!

http://www.tntmirror.com/friday/2005/jun24/column01.htm