Guyana’s political challenge
By Rickey Singh, Published on Mar 14, 2017, 10:24 pm AST, http://www.trinidadexpress.com...-political-challenge
It is most disappointing to observe today that within our Caribbean Community, the Guyana government stands out as being the one most prone to using State agencies designed for national security operations to engage in crude partisan political activities under the guise of the rule of law.
The latest example of this type of dirty, counterproductive politics occurred just this past week when members of that country’s Special Organised Crime Unit (SOCU) made a public spectacle of the abuse of state power in the arrest of a group of prominent members of the major opposition People’s Progressive Party (PPP).
Among them were former president and current opposition leader Bharrat Jagdeo and former prime minister Samuel Hinds.
Their crime? Well, the government claims “failures of legal compliance”, an allegation those arrested have strongly denied.
Caught in the middle is the SOCU which, acting on the basis of ministerial instructions, carried out the arrests with no charges formally laid at the time of writing.
This is the latest manifestation of the use of a national security agency to perform a clearly political assignment for which it was not designed when it was created two years ago; SOCU is supposed to focus on narco-trafficking...and related criminal activities, including the illegal gun trade.
As an evidently aggrieved Jagdeo declared: “In two years of this (present) government they have not made a single arrest of drug dealers of major note to block drug trafficking, nor have they brought a case against anyone for smuggling (the reported) US billion dollars per annum out of this country”.
Jagdeo invoked his presidential immunity at the time of the arrest, which was respected by the SOCU officers involved.
While the contingent of SOCU officers maintained a dignified presence during the arrests, a major question remains to be addressed.
Why those arrested in relation to the co-called “Pradoville 2” offence were not charged with any offences and required to face the courts?
With no such involvement of the courts, and given the involvement of SOCU (who ordered the arrests, given that the police commissioner was to tell the press he was at a meeting at the time of the arrests?) it would seem reasonable to assume that the bizarre political (read government) the development underscores Guyana’s deteriorating rule-of-law problem.
It is time for not just domestic and regional human rights organisations to pay heed to an evidently growing problem, but to a related abuse of state power that needs to be quickly discouraged before it’s too late.
It is not beyond the ability of Granger and Jagdeo to rise above current sharp differences in the national interest of Guyana.
But the reality is, however much officialdom would like to project a different perspective of Guyana, there is clearly an urgent need for a re-assessment of the quality of leadership Guyana is being served with.
It is my humble view that both Mr Granger and Mr Jagdeo could, if they seriously re-evaluate the increasing social and political problems that Guyana is facing, rise to this challenge.