By Richard Millington, Research Assistant – George Washington University Law School

Outgoing President, Bharrat Jagdeo

Details are emerging about the contempt US government officials developed for Guyana’s President, Bharrat Jagdeo. Apart from his obvious criminal associations, officials were incensed by Jagdeo’s People’s Progressive Party (PPP) government’s 2006 audacious attempt to use US law enforcement to emasculate the role of then Police Commissioner, Winston Felix.

“They aggressively employed draconian measures to undermine Mr. Felix to protect their criminal axis and sought our assistance to enable that subversion,” a US diplomat contends.

Jagdeo’s alleged criminal associations are so far-reaching and alarming that it motivated a senior official of the Colin Powell State Department (DOS) to regard him as a “Mafia” Head of State.

Then US Ambassador to Guyana, Ronald Bullen, in a 2006 cable to DOS stated that Guyana was believed to be “a narco-state” and that

“If Guyana is a narco-state,

then Khan is its leader” –

An indication that Jagdeo was compromised

and had surrendered governance of the country

to Khan’s criminal enterprise.

Felix drew the ire of Jagdeo over his aggressive pursuit of drug lords connected to Jagdeo’s ruling PPP, including now convicted criminal and accused murderer Roger Khan. Currently serving a 15 year sentence in the US for exporting and distributing narcotics in the US,

Khan was Jagdeo’s ally

and financier of the PPP.

The Guyanese President has condemned his arrested in Surinam and extradited to the US, via Trinidad and Tobago, as “another US “rendition.”

Guyana's former no-nonsense Police Commissioner Winston Felix

Jagdeo has offered facile denials of any association with Khan,

which strain credulity.

There is at least one tape,

reportedly in the possession of US officials,

which purportedly shows him meeting Khan.

Moreover, a Guyanese businessman informed US officials

that on one occasion when he had an appointment

with Jagdeo at Guyana’s Presidential Complex,

he was made to wait for hours.

He added that he was flabbergasted

and got a stomach ache when he saw

Jagdeo emerged from his office with Roger Khan.

The sight of the President

meeting with the country’s most notorious criminal

incensed him and forced him to relocate from Guyana.

Around 1999, Khan,

at the urging of some members of Jagdeo’s regime,

form a gang nicked-named the “phantom death squad.”

The phantom gang unleashed

a reign of terror on the Guyanese nation.

It received governmental support

through Jagdeo’s then Minister of national security Ronald Gajraj.

Telephone records show Gajraj

was in constant communication with gang leaders

before and after major murders and executions.

It was later discovered that Gajraj

was the co-leader of the gang.

The phantom gang

committed over four hundred murders for hire

and executions of mostly young African Guyanese men.

It is also responsible for hundreds of kidnappings,

including that of a US diplomat.

The gang also assassinated

then PPP Agriculture Minister Sash Shaw

as well as anti-PPP journalist Ronald Weddell.

Shaw was locked in a bitter skirmish with Khan

when he was killed.

Waddell, a television talk show host,

believed Jagdeo governed by ethnic supremacy and

was unrelentingly critical of the PPP’s association with Khan.

Jagdeo had also accused him

of forming an alliance with Buxtonans

who were resistant to the PPP government.

The melee between Khan and Shaw

stemmed from Shaw’s abrupt cancellation

of a land deal that was signed

between Khan and corrupt PPP appointees

on the Forestry Commission,

which fell within Shaw’s ministerial portfolio. 

The deal awarded a large concession of lands

to a company owned by Roger Khan,

much to the chagrin of the US government.

The US had harshly condemned the deal

in its international Narcotics Control Strategy Report.

Phantom gang murder victim

former Agriculture Minister Sash Shaw

A Canadian citizen, Shaw was himself no stranger to crime;

having been convicted of passport fraud in Canada in the 1980s.

He, his security guard

and two siblings were slaughtered

when heavily armed members of Khan’s gang

invaded his La Bonne Intention home

during a family dinner

and opened fire with machine guns.

President Jagdeo rejected

an offer of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police

to assist the Guyana Police with the investigation.

Shaw’s family has accused Jagdeo of complicity in his killing.

Some members have defected

to the opposition Alliance For Change party

while his wife has reportedly been rewarded

with a diplomatic posting ostensibly

to quell further family demands for a commission of enquiry.

Ronald Waddell

Ronald Waddell was gunned down as he left his home

in suburban Georgetown on January 30, 2006.

During Khan’s trial in a New York federal court,

Selwyn Vaughn – a former associate of Khan

turned DEA and FBI informant,

testified under oath that

Roger Khan ordered Waddell’s execution.

Vaughn testified that Khan sent him

to be the lookout man to see when Waddell arrived home,

where he kept surveillance.

He said he observed Waddell arrive home,

leave his car idling in the driveway and go into his residence.

He called and informed Khan that Waddell had arrived home.

According to the witness,

shortly after his call to Khan,

he saw four other named phantom gang members,

all former Guyana Police officers,

arrive in a Burgundy Toyota car, license number AT 192.

He said all four gang members

were armed with automatic weapons and

opened fire on Waddell as he reentered his vehicle.

He testified that after the shooting

he and the four murderers

rejoined Khan at his Blue Iguana nightclub.

According to Vaughn,

Khan, while in their presence,

telephoned Guyana’s Minister of Health, Dr. Leslie Ramsammy

and informed him that Waddell had been shot

and had been taken to the

government-owned Public Hospital Georgetown (PHG).

Khan then instructed Ramsammy

to order emergency room doctors

at the hospital to let Waddell die.

No one was ever arrested

for Waddell’s murder.

It was also established in court that Ramsammy had,

on behalf of the Guyana government,

written a Florida company – “The Spy Shop”

advising that the government of Guyana

had granted approval for Khan

to purchase and high-tech surveillance equipment

for importation to Guyana.

Khan imported the equipment

which he used to intercept his targets’ cell phone calls

and to track their location before executing them.

In March 2006,

then Police Commissioner Winston Felix,

and Army Chief of Staff Edward Collins,

directed a joint services operation which targeted Khan.

The Operation comprised officers

from the criminal investigations division

and tactical services unit (a SWAT team) of the Police Force.

They were supported by members of the

Defense Force intelligence unit.

Several of Khan’s business establishments were raided,

including the “Blue Iguana,” from which millions of dollars,

believed to be drug proceeds, were recovered.

Khan eventually escaped

as he had by that time infiltrated the Police Force

and was tipped off.

It is believed that Henry Green,

Felix’s deputy at the time and

current Police Commissioner enjoyed a friendship with Khan. 

The US subsequently abruptly revoked Green’s US visa,

ostensibly because of his criminal associations

with drug lords.

Former Guyanese army Chief of Staff Edward Collins

The operation against Khan was conducted

without the knowledge of President Jagdeo

and national security minister, Gail Teixeira,

“for fear it would have been compromised,”

a confidential Police source told CAF Blog. 

The source said that

law enforcement officials

had information that

Khan had a personal relationship with Jagdeo.

Following the raid

Khan threatened to “bring down” Jagdeo and

his government if they didn’t get Felix “off his back.”

The source said that

Khan then instructed Jagdeo

to get rid of Felix.”

Within days of the operation,

Khan, who had gone into hiding,

published a fullpage ad

in the Stabroek newspaper

boasting of being head of the “phantom gang”

and claimed he was

“working in close association

with the Jagdeo government

to “fight crime.”

Khan also announced that

he had bugged Commissioner Felix’s telephone

presumably using the surveillance computers

which he had imported,

and would release a recording with Felix. 

In a move that suggested

that he was in collaboration with the criminal

to dismantle the country’s security infrastructure

and defeat Felix,

Jagdeo, as Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces,

ordered Army Chief of Staff Edward Collins

to disband the military intelligence unit.

The criminal enterprise of Guyana

was now out to get Felix.

The following day,

Khan, seemingly working in partnership

with Jagdeo and his government,

released a CD containing an alleged recording

of a conversation between Felix and

opposition PNCR Member of parliament and

Attorney at law Basil Williams.

The alleged conversation was doctored

to give the impression that Felix was suggesting

that a woman who was connected to Guyana’s opposition leader

and who had allegedly committed grand larceny

could be planted with drugs at the airport

as she attempted to leave Guyana.

Both Williams and Felix

immediately challenged the source

and authenticity of the recording

and dismissed it as being bogus.

It was here that

President Jagdeo tipped his hand.

Instead of condemning the bugging

of the Police Commissioner’s telephone

as a dastardly breach of national security

and ordering an investigation,

Jagdeo publicly backed the criminal,

claiming that

if the voice was indeed that of Felix,

then Felix had committed a crime.

Jagdeo’s comments outraged Felix,

who questioned whether persons in the government

were complicit with the wiretap of his telephone.

Felix’s reported comments

led to a confrontational meeting

with Jagdeo on March 21, 2006.

The President purportedly demanded

that Felix retract statements

implying Government of Guyana’s complicity

with the wiretap

and suggested he take an early retirement,

but the Commissioner,

also an Attorney, flatly refused.

Roger Khan under arrest in Suriname

Disgraced former National Security Minister Ronald Gajraj

As the sordid episode unfolded,

then national security minister, Gail Teixeira,

who had just inherited the portfolio

from her disgraced predecessor Ronald Gajraj,

tried desperately to salvage

her government’s criminal image

by ingratiating herself to western diplomats,

specifically to win the confidence

of the American, British and Canadian governments –

referred to as the ABC countries.

She attained measured success

by keeping them apprised of modest crime fighting efforts

and by leaking details of internal PPP wrangling

to then Charge D’Affaires

of the US Embassy, Michael Thomas.

Thomas dispatched several cables

to the US State Department

detailing his conversations with Teixeira.

One stated that

Teixeira seemed to be fighting

a “lonely, uphill battle

in the government

against fraud and corruption,”

and hinted of Teixeira’s

vain confirmation of a

disturbingly convenient marriage of interests

between Jagdeo and Khan.  

Another said that at a meeting

with ABC Ambassadors on March 20, 2006

she agreed that the government

must give consideration to the dubious origins

of the Felix recording

and likelihood that it had been doctored..

Leaked  US government cables indicate

that Teixeira complained to the diplomats

that if Felix were to be removed

his apparent successor would have been

next in line and current Commissioner Henry Green,

who would be bad for the country because,

as they has previously discussed,

Green was corrupt and

had allegedly been benefiting financially from Roger Khan.

Teixeira, Thomas said,

then asked the Ambassadors

to leak this information to the press,

as well as the fact that it was Khan

who had bugged Felix’s phone.

A State Department source said that Teixeira,

acting on the direction of President Bharrat Jagdeo,

requested the assistance of the United States government

, through the FBI,

to determine

if the “voice in the Khan recording

was that of Police Commissioner Winston Felix.”

The source added that Teixeira

provided a CD with the alleged recording

and another recording with a speech Felix

had delivered to his officers..... for FBI analysis.

Guyana's incumbent Police Commissioner Henry Green

who US visa has been revoked

for alleged criminal associations with

The FBI

summarily rejected the government of Guyana (GoG)

request for a voice analysis,

indicating that neither of the two tape recordings provided

were original copies

and thus, their authenticity was dubious.

A US official pointed out that

even if the tapes were original copies,

the FBI would not have proceded with the analysis

because they were fully aware that

“President Jagdeo was attempting to use the US

to legitimize his attempts to implicate the Police Commissioner

who was attempting to bring down

one of Jagdeo’s alleged criminal associates.”

By the time GoG request got to the FBI,

it had already come

under a barrage of withering attacks from Rickford Burke,

the influential President of the New York based

Caribbean Guyana Institute for Democracy (CGID).

Burke dispatched a letter to

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice,

through New York Governor George Pataki,

detailing Jagdeo’s alleged criminal association with Khan

and called on the Bush administration

to distance itself from Jagdeo

who he claimed was harboring Khan –

a fugitive from US law.

At the time, the CGID was leading an international campaign

against Jagdeo’s government

for its false imprisonment of journalist

Mark Benschop on fabricated treason charges,

and to expose Jagdeo’s apparent complicity

with the Guyana’s violent criminal enterprise.

Burke told CAF Blog that in 2005

he and New York State Senator, John Sampson,

led a CGID delegation to the State Department

to discuss the situation in Guyana,

including Jagdeo and Gajraj’s criminal associations. 

He said that the

Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for the Caribbean affairs

in the Western Hemisphere Division

advised the delegation

that the US government

had severed all communication with Gajraj

and was engaging Felix directly on law enforcement

and national security matters.

He said that they were assured

that security assistance and cooperation with GoG

had been pulled from the Ministry of National Security

and channeled directly to the Police Force.

CGID's 2005 delegation at the US State Department

Pressure from CGID

and the political opposition in Guyana

forced the US government

to issue a statement on April 12, 2005,

condemning Gajraj’s reappointment

following the release of the findings of an inquiry

into extra-judicial killings.

Assistant Secretary of State Richard Boucher

said in the statement

that “the United States is concerned

by the Government of Guyana’s decision

to reinstate former Home Minister Ronald Gajraj….

A Guyanese commission of inquiry

looking into his links to the so-called

‘phantom death squad‘

has found serious procedural irregularities

in his official conduct related

to his involvement with individuals

who allegedly carried out extra-judicial killings….

We believe significant questions remain unanswered

regarding his involvement in serious criminal activities…” 

  The US position forced Gajraj to resign

but Jagdeo immediately appointed him as ambassador to India

and whisked him out of Guyana

under cover of diplomatic immunity. 

Jagdeo then appointed Teixeira to replace him.

Teixeira, who had previously served as Health

as well as Youth and Culture Minister,

was reassigned to the National Security ministry

by Jagdeo under the guise

that she would clean-up Gajraj’s mess.

She had the rug pulled from under her

as it became obvious that she was intellectually moribund

and out of her depth.

Ultimately she was removed from the cabinet

and made a presidential advisor on governance.

Referring to Teixeira’s recent comments

that Felix had dropped the ball on crime

because he was obsessed with Roger Khan,

Burke said those comments reflected

her pedestrian thinking and a

stunning inability to grasp the facts and

causations of the crime spree.

“It was Roger Khan and his gang

that committed 90% of the crimes,

so who else should

the police have been targeting,

if not the rats in the sewage system?”

Burke questioned.

“It is obvious that this woman

lacked the intellectual

heft to manage the country’s national security portfolio.

Her demotion

to a so-called presidential advisor position

was justifiable and

in the best interest of the country,”

Burke said.

He observed that her most useful purpose

during her tenure was that of a gossip mill

for western diplomats who gleaned from her

a clear insight into PPP corruption

and complicity with criminals.

Guyana's former

National Security Minister

Gail Texeira

In May of 2010 Teixeira blatantly lied to

the United Nations Human Rights Council

in Geneva, Switzerland.

Responding to a question from

Canadian Ambassador Jeffrey Heaton

on a fifteen year-old school boy, Twyon Thomas,

whose genitals had been burnt

by Guyana Police while they tortured him,

Teixeira told the council that

the government had compensated the child

and provided him with counseling and medical treatment,

and had brought the perpetrators to justice –

a blatant falsehood.

As the November 2011 elections approach,

Guyanese are required

to take stock of the myriad of abysmal failures

of governance the PPP regime under Jagdeo.

It must also consider the blatant associations

with the criminal enterprise and

the criminally influenced leadership Jagdeo,

Gajraj, Green, Texeira and others;

including the bungling intellectually challenged

Minister of Home Affairs, Clement Rohee,

whose US visa has also been revoked.

The total failure of the government

in its responsibility to provide security

to the Guyanese citizens is consistent

with the mediocrity emanating from

the minimal ethics and competence

of the tragicomic and embarrassing triumvirate of

Jagdeo, Teixeira and Rohee.

Will the Guyanese people vote to dispatch the PPP mafia

, who sold out the country’s security apparatus to criminals,

to the halls of justice?

The verdict comes on November 28!