Prime Minister Patrick Manning has argued that this country needs the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) as its final appellate court in order to resume hangings.

’The CCJ is not a hanging court, let me make that clear,’ stressed Manning as he explained to the hundreds present that with the Privy Council as the final court, the views of the people of this country are not reflected.

’Is it not time for us to move away from the Privy Council, but an arrangement that takes into account not the views and the aspirations of the United Kingdom and Western Europe, but Trinidad and Tobago and the Caribbean,’ Manning said on Monday night, while speaking at a PNM public meeting in Sangre Grande.

Manning said the Privy Council determines matters that come before it based on the principles ’existing not in the Caribbean, but the UK and Europe’.

Referring to the death penalty, he said, ’The Privy Council goes out of its way to ensure that the death penalty is not carried out in Trinidad and Tobago.

’I ask you the question, is that your view? And, if that is not your view, is it not time to move away from the Privy Council?’

He said in 1998 when he was Opposition Leader, the secretary general of Caricom paid him a visit to talk about the CCJ and he had given his support to the establishment of the court’s headquarters in this country.

He said the UNC government at that time, led by Basdeo Panday, had also pledged their support, but when they lost the next election this changed.

Manning slammed the immaturity of the UNC over this change of heart, adding that something was not right with that situation.

The CCJ headquarters is based in Port of Spain, but it is not the final appellate court in the country as the Privy Council still stands.