Vice President and Public Security Minister Khemraj Ramjattan

Conceding to mounting no-confidence calls

– insists Govt will still use “dogs” and “horses” to fight crime

By Michael Younge

Just when Guyanese thought the public discourse on crime could not become more “depressing” as described by Finance Minister Winston Jordan, Vice President and Public Security Minister Khemraj Ramjattan on Wednesday evening insinuated that the fired Community Support Officers (CSOs), who are largely of indigenous heritage, were responsible for the rising levels of crime and criminality in Guyana.

Ramjattan was at the time addressing the National Assembly as parliamentarians continued Day Three of the debates on the $221 billion National Budget presented by Finance Minister Winston Jordan last Monday for approval.

A bullet riddled wall after bandits attacked in Corentyne

The Vice President was seeking to respond to the Opposition’s claim that since the new Government took office back in May, it has been unable to deal with the crime situation or competently implement measures aimed at reducing crime and making Guyana safe.

In his defence, Ramjattan, who has core responsibility for the sector, said that the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) Opposition was deliberately misleading the public and the fact remained that crime was on the increase since 2014 and continued to soar in February 2015, long before the new Government took office.

“It was growing since February, long before we come into Government; long, around the same time y’all stop paying the indigenous CSOs, the thing start going up around that time,” he said.

Outrage

While his statement was factually correct, his implied slur on indigenous criminality immediately evoked outrage in the Opposition benches especially amongst those of Amerindian heritage. This forced the Speaker, Dr Barton Scotland to make frantic attempts to return order to the proceedings.

Despite these pleas, the outbursts continued, but this did not stop Ramjattan from continuing his presentation which had him shouting at the top of his voice to drown out the voices of the Opposition Members of Parliament (MPs).

At this point, Chief Whip for the Opposition, Gail Teixeira sprang to her feet, seeking to have the Speaker support her position that Ramjattan withdraw what she referred to as a “racist and criminal” charge made against the CSOs and by extension, law-abiding Amerindians.

“He is making a link between the CSOs not being paid and the increase in crime. It is unacceptable in this House. I am asking that he withdraw that comment,” Teixeira said. Making racist statements in the National Assembly is supposed to be sanctioned.

But as has become the norm, the Government nominated and elected Speaker ignored the Chief Whip and refused to examine the Public Security Minister’s statement for racist imputations. Instead he requested that Ramjattan continue his presentation.

After making the controversial statement, Ramjattan, contrary to the statement being recorded on the Hansard,   denied that he was making a nexus between the firing of the Amerindians and the rising levels of crime

Later on Wednesday evening, the PPP/C in a statement said that the new Government was attempting to do damage control by trying to make efforts to cover its tracks with the implementation of a Hinterland Employment and Youth Services programme especially after the legal proceedings filed on behalf of the 1972 CSOs.

The Party said “in the absence of information regarding this hastily announced statement in the Parliament, seems to be a training programme and not employment for the fired Amerindians. The legal, political and constitutional wrongs have already been done”.

It also argued that “the PPP will only accept a full reinstatement of the CSOs” as it stated that it condemn “the statement by Vice President and Minister of Public Security, Khemraj Ramjattan in Parliament, that the crime wave escalated when the CSOs were dismissed”.

“We consider this statement to be racist, irresponsible and most disrespectful to our Amerindian brothers and sisters and indeed to all victims of crime and all law-abiding citizens,” the PPP/C maintained.

Dogs and horses

Despite being ridiculed in both mass and social media forums for failing to present realistic and more serious proposals to fight crime, Minister Ramjattan maintained that he was going to use “horses” and “canines” as an important element in his plan to deal with the phenomenon.

He argued that a lot has already being invested on canine handler training amid canine jokes from various parts of the Parliament.

Test match crime-fighting skills

The Minister also took a swipe at all those who wanted instant and short-term solutions to fighting crime.

He said, “This crime rate is not T20 cricket. This is a Test match we talking ’bout and it will take some time before the crime rate goes down because you have to put a number of programmes and packages together.”

He called for the root causes of crime to be addressed, explaining that greed propelled crime.

“I had to inform them [the Police Commanders] that crime comes about also because of a terrible human condition called greed… like some people who are former Ministers having eight cars and huge chunks of money,” he remarked.

The usual resources were given to the security forces to fight crime and these included $125 million which was allocated to purchase arms and ammunition as well as fingerprint and ballistic equipment.

Some $193 million was allocated for vehicles, trucks, motorcycles and outboard engines.

That aside, Ramjattan spoke about the installation of Closed Circuit Television (CCTV) cameras on every street in the city and Government’s plan to raise the morale of the ranks of the security forces.

No emphasis was placed on the detailed measures and plans which the new Government had, since in Opposition, for fighting crime or how they would be financed.

Currently, public outrage is mounting as crime and criminality surge, but this has not done anything to force the new Government to move faster to deal with these concerns.

Recently, the PPP/C was called upon to use its position in the National Assembly to declare “no confidence” in Public Security Minister Ramjattan and have him replaced by a more capable Minister in the crucial area of national security.

The call was made by Associate Professor of Political Science at Nassau Community College, Dr Baytoram Ramharack, in his latest column in the Guyana Times. The New York University trained political scientist was involved in Guyanese politics for several decades and was one of the founding members of the Jaguar Committee for Democracy and the ROAR political party.

Dr Ramharack said the crime situation in Guyana, particularly in Berbice, has risen to unacceptable heights and believed that a change in management of the security sector may see a change for the better. Dr Ramharack hails from Berbice.

Using the statistics provided recently by the Guyana Police Force, Dr Ramharack showed a 10 per cent increase in criminal activities by the end of July compared to the same period last year. Murders, he said, increased from 80 to almost 100 within a year.

“It’s reported that 35 murders were committed in Georgetown/East Bank Demerara (A Division), 17 in East Coast Demerara (C Division)and 16 in Berbice(B Division), 12 in the Interior (F Division), and four each in West Bank Demerara/East Bank Essequibo(D Division) and Linden/Kwakwani (E Division), while six were recorded in Essequibo Coast/Islands(G Division). Given our geographical population distribution, these figures indicate that murder is a national problem that occurs throughout Guyana,” Dr Ramharack said.

On Wednesday, newly-appointed PPP/C Member of Parliament (MP) Cornel Damon declared in the National Assembly on Wednesday that Ramjattan needed to go, since the Ministry was failing miserably to reduce or even stabilise the soaring crime rate.

“The Honourable Member has no plan to fight the surge of crime and the senseless killings of our businessmen and women and so the Honourable Minister Ramjattan must go,” Damon exclaimed.

The politician pointed out that in the 10th Parliament, it was Ramjattan who engineered calls for then Home Affairs Minister Clement Rohee to go when the crime rate was 40 per cent lower than it is today.

Former President Donald Ramotar, during an interview with the Guyana Times, also contended that the Ministry has not performed at all in the area of crime fighting, noting that the A Partnership for National Unity/Alliance For Change (APNU/AFC) has yet again failed the Guyanese people.

“When they were in Opposition they claim to know everything, but they are clearly not grappling with the problem that has been created,” Ramotar stated.

He asserted that the coalition Government was to be blamed for the current situation because when it was in Opposition, it established a record of defending criminals and now that it was in Executive Office, the individuals now feel more empowered to commit felonies.