Leader of the Opposition Ralph Gonsalves has once again criticised the appointment of Brenton Smith as an acting assistant commissioner of police, saying that he intends to write to CARICOM and the Commonwealth about what he termed the “dangerous politicisation” of the police force.
Gonsalves’ comments on Wednesday came two days after Trevor “Buju” Bailey, Junior Simmons and Smith were appointed to act as commissioner of police, deputy commissioner of police and assistant commissioner of police, respectively.
“The agencies in CARICOM which deal with crime and security are going to have a problem, and so, too, the international agencies are going to have a problem,” the opposition leader said on his radio programme.
“The DEA (Drug Enforcement Agency), the FBI (Federal Bureau of Investigation), the British Intelligence Services, the French, they are going to have a difficult time with loose-lipped politicians who don’t know when to talk and what to talk … and police politicians in police uniforms,” he said.
Gonsalves first spoke out after Minister of National Security St. Clair Leacock announced, in May, the impending promotion of Smith, a career police officer.
He criticised the appointment, saying other qualified officers could have been promoted.
Smith was fired from the police force in 2021 after refusing to take the COVID-19 vaccine, which the then Gonsalves-led Unity Labour Party government made mandatory for all frontline workers, including police, teachers and medical staff.
Smith was subsequently elected as the general secretary of the then-opposition New Democratic Party (NDP) and was reinstated to the police force shortly after the party won the November 2025 general election.
“Bailey is a good policeman. But if you want to say that you have a seriousness in the police force, how can you take a politician like Smith who was station sergeant five years ago, didn’t take the vaccine, went home — could have come back you know, waiting to see if he could get rid of Ralph and the ULP — come back in, make him skip assistant superintendent and came straight to assistant commissioner,” the opposition leader said.
Gonsalves contended that Smith was catapulted solely on the basis of political allegiance.
“Anytime I see Smith and any reasonable man sees Smith, you see a politician in uniform; the people who are subordinate to him in the police force when they see him, they see Smith as a politician in uniform.”
Gonsalves said that he had nothing personal against Smith and pledged to work with Bailey and Simmons in his capacity as a political leader, leader of the opposition and a former minister of national security.
“They’re not politicians in police uniform, but Smith is a politician in police uniform. It’s like you put a politician and put him in judicial robes,” Gonsalves said.