Dear Editor,

The recent “confrontation” between Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller and Vashon Brown, a Television Jamaica reporter, is very unfortunate and ought not to have occurred for a number of reasons.

I blame the prime minister’s security detail 100 per cent for this incident. From what I saw on the television clip, the prime minister was attempting to walk away when the reporter ran ahead of her, blocking her path, and pushed his microphone almost touching her face while asking questions.

Commissioner of Police Owen Ellington should, in my view, forthwith relieve members of the prime minister’s present security detail of their responsibilities as it is evident that they were not giving the level of VIP protection to which the prime minister is entitled.

Whether we like Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller or not, we must accept that she is our prime minister and she is entitled to be accorded professional VIP protection.

Freedom of the press cannot be interpreted to mean that you can block the path of the prime minister and conduct yourself in a way to suggest that you will not allow her free passage unless she answers your question.

Freedom of the press does not mean that those who work in and for the press are semi-gods to whom all the rest of us are obligated.

The standard practice of VIP protection is that there is an inner perimeter which is strictly enforced and an outer perimeter which is less strictly enforced.

The prime minister’s detail should have handled the inner perimeter in such a way that nobody could come within arm’s length of the her unless it is her desire.

It is not the duty of a security detail to accommodate or to restrain the press. Their sole duty is to protect the prime minister from any and every person who seeks to get so close to her that they could physically harm her.

This is a most urgent matter for the commissioner of police.

Linton P Gordon

St Ann

lpgordon@cwjamaica.com