Trinidad: Former intelligence official backpedals on claim that Rowley  instructed firing of East Indians

(Trinidad Guardian) For­mer di­rec­tor of in­tel­li­gence at the Strate­gic Ser­vices Agency (SSA) Carl­ton Den­nie has backpedalled on ac­cus­ing Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley of di­rect­ly in­struct­ing him to fire all East In­di­ans from the agency back in 2015.

“First, I would like to set the record straight about what I did not say. I did not say that the PNM told me to fire the East In­di­ans. I did not say that the Min­is­ter of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty (Dil­lon) told me to fire the east In­di­ans.

“So for the PM to go harp­ing on these is­sues to cre­ate spins and redi­rect and re­fo­cus of the main is­sues just shows the games that pol­i­tics play to off­set the minds of peo­ple in the pub­lic,” Den­nie said as he changed his tune re­gard­ing the SSA eth­nic cleans­ing al­le­ga­tions at a press con­fer­ence at the Chan­cel­lor Ho­tel, St Ann’s, Thurs­day, say­ing he want­ed to clear the air on what he did not say.

His com­ments came three days af­ter Den­nie mount­ed a Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) plat­form al­leg­ing that when the Row­ley-led ad­min­is­tra­tion came in­to pow­er in 2015, he was asked to fire all East In­di­ans from the SSA.

On Mon­day night at the Debe High School, Den­nie told UNC sup­port­ers he was in­vit­ed to join the se­cu­ri­ty in­tel­li­gence agency in 1997 be­cause of his vast knowl­edge in elec­tron­ic and com­mu­ni­ca­tion tech­nol­o­gy.

“I was in­vit­ed to join the se­cu­ri­ty in­tel­li­gence agency in 1997 be­cause of my vast knowl­edge in elec­tron­ic and com­mu­ni­ca­tion tech­nol­o­gy. I joined the SSA and served this coun­try in the ca­pac­i­ty of di­rec­tor of in­tel­li­gence.

“Oropouche East, af­ter this Row­ley PNM fired the le­git­i­mate di­rec­tor of the SSA in 2015 and re­placed him with the il­le­gal in­ter­im di­rec­tor, I am the per­son that they asked to fire all the East In­di­ans in the SSA and I told them no I am not do­ing that,” he told the gath­er­ing.

“This made the dai­ly news­pa­pers. I re­mind­ed Kei­th Row­ley and the then min­is­ter of na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty Dil­lon that in this coun­try every creed and race will find an equal place. I told them no, I am not fir­ing East In­di­ans.”

The al­le­ga­tions, how­ev­er, in­fu­ri­at­ed Row­ley, who, on Tues­day, shot back say­ing Den­nie had made an “un­var­nished lie” and blamed the UNC of try­ing to cre­ate racial dis­cord in the coun­try.

At yes­ter­day’s press con­fer­ence, Den­nie gave a dif­fer­ent sto­ry.

As SSA di­rec­tor of in­tel­li­gence, Den­nie said he served un­der four heads of the Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Coun­cil, not­ing he would have at­tend­ed ses­sions to rep­re­sent the agency.

He al­leged it was Matthew An­drews, the “for­mer il­le­gal in­ter­im di­rec­tor of the SSA” who “asked me to as­sist him in fir­ing the East In­di­ans from the SSA.”

While Den­nie did not call An­drews’ name on the plat­form, he said he told An­drews “to go and tell them that I am not do­ing that.”

When re­mind­ed of his quote at the UNC meet­ing, Den­nie ad­vised re­porters to “read the flow, Eng­lish Lan­guage is the won­der­ful lan­guage for pol­i­tics. I told him (An­drews) to tell them.”

He said the use of the word “them” could have a dou­ble mean­ing and re­ferred to in­di­vid­u­als who in­struct­ed An­drews.

“If the PM takes that to mean him, then so be it,” he said.

Den­nie said if the me­dia ques­tions An­drews as to who gave those in­struc­tions, proof would be sup­plied.

“I have placed my char­ac­ter in the hands of a man whom I be­lieve by now would have re­viewed his ac­tions and is now will­ing to speak the truth,” he said.

Den­nie called out the names of 14 In­di­ans who were fired, forced out and con­struc­tive­ly dis­missed from the SSA when Row­ley as­sumed of­fice, adding he has noth­ing to hide.

Asked if some of these work­ers’ con­tracts may have come to an end and just not re­newed, Den­nie said based on what he was told they fired the East In­di­ans, which he con­clud­ed was “spite­ful.”

Hav­ing served the SSA for 18 years, Den­nie said the agency usu­al­ly re­news con­tracts. How­ev­er, he said he and sev­er­al oth­ers were ter­mi­nat­ed based on loss of trust and con­fi­dence by for­mer na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty min­is­ter Ed­mund Dil­lon.

Ques­tioned why he was now bring­ing the is­sue up, Den­nie said his am­bi­tion was to serve in the Par­lia­ment.

“I want to go in­to the Par­lia­ment of T&T. I want to stand up for these peo­ple who were fired wrong­ful­ly.”

When some­one is dis­missed wrong­ful­ly, Den­nie said, it jeop­ar­dis­es peo­ple’s ca­reers and he was a vic­tim of such.

Asked about state­ments by Row­ley that he had a record of poor be­hav­iour and in­sub­or­di­na­tion at the agency, Den­nie said he could not re­mem­ber if he was is­sued warn­ing let­ters while at the SSA.

“If I was is­sued a warn­ing let­ter it would have come from a par­tic­u­lar di­rec­tor who I had re­port­ed to the PS,” he said.

Den­nie said he al­so did not speak to UNC leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar be­fore he spoke on the plat­form.

Asked if he was will­ing to apol­o­gise to Row­ley for call­ing his name on the UNC plat­form, Den­nie said he was will­ing to apol­o­gise to any­one who felt of­fend­ed by what he said. How­ev­er, he said the truth of­fends.

Former Strategic Services Agency director of intelligence Carlton Dennie (right) talks to the media at a press conference at Chancellor Hotel in St Ann’s yesterday.