October 25 2018
Dear Editor,
The recent escape of three inmates from the Lusignan prison and the subsequent riot that resulted in 10 prisoners being injured by rubber bullets and live rounds used by security officers who were called out to quell the uprising, have once again brought to the fore the challenges facing Guyana in its overcrowded prisons and poorly managed penal system.
The comments by the Minister of Public Security, as quoted in a Demerara Waves article on October 17. 2018 captioned, “Improved prisons hinged on oil money – Ramjattan”: and a letter that was written by his predecessor, Clement Rohee, that was published in the Stabroek News on October 18, 2018, captioned `Coalition gov’t has to be more inclusive in management of the serious prisons problems’ are both instructive.
Mr. Rohee in his letter stated, “On assuming office, Mr. Ramjattan rejected the sound policies he inherited from the previous PPP/C administration…” However, not unsurprisingly he failed to outline what those “sound policies” were. Anyone reading Rohee’s letter in the context of the caption will have tremendous difficulty in attempting to understand what the former minister refers to as inclusive management of the prison’s problems. As I have stated he made no substantial arguments in support of his position. What was unmistakable was the self-serving nature of the letter, which sought to rewrite history with his ridiculous claim that the prisons and the crime situation in Guyana were well managed under his and the PPP/C’s stewardship.
The facts tell a different story. It cannot be denied as Rohee attempts to do, that the genesis of the nation’s prisons and crime crisis is rooted in the 23 years of PPP/C rule. The mismanagement of the crime and security situation in the country under the PPP/C and the involvement of high government officials in the facilitation of criminal activity during that period saw crime and the behaviour of criminals degenerating to levels never seen before in the modern history of Guyana. At the height of that crisis, hundreds of citizens including police officers were murdered. As a result of the PPP/C regime covenant with known drug lords, the nation witnessed for the first time in its history, the emergence of an unprecedented rise in state-sponsored executions, that led to the birth of the so-called phantom killers and the criminalization of the state. Mr. Rohee must explain why none of the known phantom killers was brought to justice under his stewardship. In fact, it is important to note that when the head of the criminal enterprise in Guyana, Roger Khan, was captured in Suriname and the Surinamese authorities offered to return him to Guyana, the then Minister of Home Affairs, Hon. Gail Teixeira said that Khan was not wanted in Guyana for any criminal act. He was subsequently handed over by Surinamese officials to US law enforcement officers, taken to the USA, entered a plea bargain arrangement, and was convicted and sentenced to 15 years imprisonment in a US prison.
All of the above had a negative impact on the political, economic and social situation in the country. The end results were overcrowded jails that up to today are populated with young men most of whom were born and brought up under the PPP/C regime. It is this reality that was inherited by the APNU+AFC coalition government. It is obvious that in the prisons the “chickens” came home to roost – so to speak – and the phenomenon of the prisoners on the “roof” to “riots and fires” were spawned. The nation is now reaping the seeds that were sowed by the PPP/C administration, which is proving to be a difficult situation for the present government, given the population’s desire for a significant reduction in crime.
Minister Ramjattan‘s statement that “improved prisons hinged on oil money”, when taken with his revelation that the government had unsuccessfully, approached international agencies for finance to build new prisons seems to suggest that the administration is anticipating a rise, rather than a reduction, in the prison population in the immediate period ahead. This is a frightening thought, even though all that the minister may have been doing is expressing the thinking of the cabinet, and what his security advisors may have told him.
With the pending oil wealth, we as a nation must commit to public policies which are designed to address the fundamental social and economic issues that are negatively impacting the nation, particularly among the youth population, with the intention of reducing the flow of citizens entering the prisons. When it is realized that the vast majority of these citizens are from the poor and powerless in the society the need for action becomes more urgent.
The logic of this argument is that we must stop thinking of building new prisons instead, we ought to be looking at meaningful solutions to reduce the need for jails. Guyana needs a more enlightened policy to address the country’s prison challenges both in the short and long term. Oil money will give us the opportunity to do so. Cash payouts from oil revenues to Guyanese households will contribute to the limitation of the spread of poverty and crime among the nation’s youths by economically empowering poor households.
Yours faithfully,
Tacuma Ogunseye
