Issue No: 637; 29 March 2001

Responding to the takeover of the Sabeto Primary School by villagers claiming to be landowners, the Prime Minister stated that the Native Lands Trust Board and the police must take responsibility for the forced closure of the Sabeto Primary School on Tuesday.

Chaudhry stated: "This is not the first time police have allowed such acts of lawlessness to take place on the pretext that it is a civil matter. Anyone who enters a property unlawfully is committing a criminal act." He further said that there are "scores of examples of police inaction in dealing with landowners unlawfully entering and seizing property, in what are clear cases of criminal activity. Tenant cane farmers have been major victims of such harassment."

Chaudhry blamed the NLTB for failing "to keep [villagers] informed of its agreement with the school committee".

Chaudhry claimed that the demand for the additional money as a `goodwill' is "sheer extortion". He said "schools are non-profit making organisations and should not be subjected to such extortion".

"It is sad that the very people, including those in high office, who are responsible for upholding and enforcing the law are fostering such lawlessness through their own conduct and disrespect for the rule of law," he said.