Dear Editor,

A series of fast moving events in the last few days in Guyana have captured the attention of Guyanese at home and abroad, causing many to wonder if things are coming to a head in Guyana after months of intense scrutiny of the Jagdeo administration.

First, we have Head of the Presidential Secretariat, Dr. Roger Luncheon, saying that the security sector reform will go on despite the British pulling their aid offer off the table. But if we are to use the pace at which progress of other reforms – broadcast and Local Government come readily to mind – government promised over the years as a gauge of how soon the security sector reform will be finished, it could be a long, long time from now.

By the way, Guyanese who may be inclined to support the government’s position against the British need to remember that it was President Bharrat Jagdeo who, according to the British High Commission, wrote two letters to the British government seeking their assistance in dealing with the out-of-control crime spree that threatened to cause the implosion of society. So if the British responded by offering aid with specific conditions, then the Jagdeo administration should not be making all this noise as though the British were the bad guys here.

In fact, rather than running his mouth accusing the British of wanting to be chief cook and bottle washer, Dr. Luncheon should recognize that beggars can’t be choosers or else they run the risk of being losers.

And as matters now stand, the British are not the losers here, but the people of Guyana are, because the Guyana Police Force remains unreformed despite band-aid treatments.  Second, Dr. Luncheon reportedly told the sugar workers union, GAWU, that it needs to take a comprehensive view of sugar rather than the woefully one-sided view. He added that sugar is bigger than the sugar workers and the union, because sugar is about Guyana. Who would have thought the day would come when a leading member of the PPP and its government would openly chastise the PPP union, GAWU, which represents sugar workers, who represent a significant portion of the PPP support base?

At the time of this writing (Friday, October 30), I read a post on the Internet attributed to the Associated Press that 10,000 sugar workers went on strike again to press demands for better wages, and that the industry had been crippled. As adverted to above, GAWU is the PPP’s labour union and the Jagdeo administration, which runs Guysuco, is there compliments of the PPP, so what really is motivating GAWU to go to these lengths of repeatedly taking industrial action against a company run by the government, which, like GAWU, is directly linked to the PPP? Traditionally, strike action by GAWU against the PNC government was seen as a weapon to get at the government, so the obvious question is whether the strike action is being used as a weapon against the Jagdeo administration.

Yes, this industrial action may have a lot more to do with the internal politics of the PPP, in which there may be two factions – one for the President and the other against the President. I could be wrong, but if Guysuco and the government took the time to explain the dire straits in which the company finds itself, having lost GY$3B in 2008, why wouldn’t GAWU resonate with and be sympathetic to the company and the government, all of which come under the PPP umbrella? In fact, why is there a deafening silence coming from Freedom House in the face of these industrial agitations by sugar workers, who represent a significant percentage of the PPP’s support base?

Unless I missed it, I have not read any statement put out by the PPP for or against the decision to strike or for or against the government’s reaction to the strike. Something weird in taking place and I am wondering if it portends a possible chess move ahead by the PPP or the President that could see a paradigm shift in the structure and direction of the party, or even the government.

Third, we have the police going gingerly after Mark Benschop to search for a radio transmitting device and then arresting him for obstruction of justice. Going by the news account of Stabroek News, Mr. Benschop’s attorney, Mr. Nigel Hughes, said he asked for and saw a copy of the purported warrant to search Mr. Benschop’s house, but the warrant lacked a name and an address, which should be on any search warrant issued by a judge/magistrate. In New York, the Police Department’s Tactical Unit raided an apartment looking for a quantity of illegal drugs, but they erred because the name and apartment number on the search warrant did not match the apartment they raided, which turned out to be occupied by a lone elderly woman.

They damaged the woman’s furniture and scared the daylight out of her. Of course she was duly compensated, but warrants have names and addresses for a reason. If there was no name or address on the warrant to raid Mr. Bemschop’s house, then the warrant was not legal, the raid on the home was illegal and whatever was seized has to be thrown out in a court of law.

There are some people who think Mr. Benschop was illegally transmitting radio signals from somewhere and that the action by the government was appropriate, but those same people are disturbingly silent in the face of government’s intransigence on the issuance of radio broadcast licences for the last 17 years, even as government boasts of its support for freedom of expression and support of a free media. I am aware that Mr. Benschop does have an Internet radio programme, but whether Internet radio falls under the category of traditional radio has never been stated in any written law in Guyana that recognizes Internet radio as traditional radio.

The absurdity of the Jagdeo administration continues to baffle even the most casual observer; whether it relates to the withdrawal of British aid for security sector reform, the apparent lack of unity between the administration and the ruling PPP as evidenced by the party’s labour union striking against the government and its sugar company, or the sloppy manner in which the NMFU and the police handled the search of Mr. Benschop’s house. I hope most readers of the SN article note that the NMFU manager did have a bag in his hand when he showed up at Mr. Benschop’s house, and since no one seems to know what was in the bag, it creates an opportunity for accusations. 

Yours faithfully,
Emile Mervin