Semi-autonomous agencies and individuals were also issued with army weapons during the Forbes Burnham-led PNC administration in the 1970s and beyond, well-placed sources in the Guyana Defence Force (GDF) said yesterday.
The sources said also that according to the GDF’s records, at least one current senior PNCR official, in whose name weapons were issued, had not returned them to date.
President Bharrat Jagdeo had announced last week that he would commission a board of inquiry to investigate how many guns were issued to government departments by all paramilitary organisations from the 1950s to present. He did not give a timeframe for the inquiry, though hinting that it would begin soon.
Jagdeo had also disclosed that between 1976 and 1979 some 237 guns of various calibre were issued to the Ministry of National Deve-lopment.
The announcement was triggered after the police recovering three weapons from gunmen in the Zeskendren, Mahaicony area, two weeks ago. The GDF subsequently said that two of the weapons — an M-72 rifle and a 9 mm Beretta submachine gun – belonged to the military and had been issued to the Ministry of Mobilisation and National Development between 1976-1979.
Speaking to Stabroek News yesterday the army sources said weapons were not only issued to the Ministry of Mobilisation and National Development, but several other such agencies. According to the sources, based on records more than 237 weapons might have been issued and their issuance continued way past 1979. The sources mentioned that guns were issued to the Guyana Police Force, Omai Gold Mines Ltd, Guyana Geology and Mines Commission and other semi-autonomous bodies.
The army sources also disclosed that at one time some 50 Beretta submachine guns were issued to the youth arm of a political party.
PNCR Leader Robert Corbin had said last week that he believed weapons issued to the Ministry of National Development in the 1970s were returned and he urged the army to verify its records before making public declarations. But the army sources said that based on the GDF’s records some of the weapons had not been returned. The sources argued that the GDF had credible records, which would be proven at the time of the investigation.
Corbin had criticized the government for not moving with the same alacrity to investigate other matters of national security in the past. He said that Jagdeo, as Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces, did not order a full investigation into the theft of the 30 AK-47 rifles in 2006 from the army storage bond.
Speaking at a press conference last Wednesday, Corbin did not say outright that the Ministry of National Development had received weapons from the army. Instead, he said that some decisions taken back then were of a security nature and he would not speak of them. However, he added that if the President wanted to conduct an investigation into weapons issued by the security forces back then, it should be done in the context of security conditions that existed at that time in the country’s history.
Jagdeo had told a press conference he was very concerned that the weapons ended up in the hands of criminals.
Corbin had argued that no weapon was ever issued to his party, and if weapons were issued to the Ministry of National Development and Mobilisation it was entirely a government arrangement, since the ministry was part of the state.
Noting that he did not have a problem with the President ordering an investigation, and offering his fullest co-operation, Corbin said he could not help but note that the government had moved with commendable speed in this instance, though it had dragged its feet over other investigations.
