The Tribune

By KHRISNA VIRGIL kvirgil@tribunemedia.net WHILE denying he used the police force for the FNM's political gain, National Security Minister Tommy Turnquest yesterday stressed to the opposition they should not be worried about clandestine police activity if they are running a "clean campaign". Mr Turnquest said if information unearthed by the police is released by the government, it will be beacuse it is "information that Bahamians should know". "There is no new unit in the police force to deal with politics. They are trying to create something out of nothing," he said. Mr Turnquest was responding to Fox Hill MP Fred Mitchell's claim that the FNM has created a special police unit to investigate the campaigning practices of the PLP and DNA. Yesterday, Fox Hill MP Fred Mitchell, said he is unwilling to accept Mr Turnquest's "so-called denial". On Wednesday, Mr Mitchell claimed that according to his information, several officers from other areas of the force were reassigned to a "political police unit." Mr Mitchell said the creation of such a unit would support his party's long-held belief that the government, through the Ministry of National Security, has long used security information in the political arena. "Mr Turnquest has publicly said and even threatened the opposition with information contained in national security records," he said. "At one point, he said he had information in files that would cause people to go to jail, is he now judge and jury?" "That within itself stinks if an abuse of his office and he, as the force's Minister, using such information on a public platform is certainly inappropriate. "It is pure politicising of the minister of national's security's privileged information." Mr Turnquest's statement follows a DNA party insider's claim that officers of this "special unit" were assigned to watch the party's leader Branville McCartney. The source said: "We were at an initial meeting for the DNA at the home of Branville McCartney when I saw a man whom I knew to be a police officer lurking around the periphery of the house." "I then saw him at another event where he told me that he had gotten orders to do surveillance of the residence and to monitor who was going and coming." Since the initial story broke, another police officer admitted that the "special unit" operates and that he was reassigned as a "political investigator".