Dear Editor,
In reference to the article written by Mr Ramkarran on ‘Sean Hinds’ and death squads (Sunday Stabroek, July 26) I would like to submit the following observations (edited) that were made contemporaneously with the events referred to by Mr Hinds. I believe they are still relevant today.
“The need for us to have a state that serves the interests of all Guyanese, to be beholden to no partisan interest, to be staffed by Guyanese who see themselves as a ‘Universal Class’ is a point that ROAR has been pushing from our inception. It’s a point that doesn’t seem to be appreciated by the PPP and the PNC – and to be frank – apparently by most Guyanese.
“Guyanese have stood by and seen those who control the state use the organs of the state and extra-state organisations to pursue narrow partisan interests for so long that apparently they feel this is the way things ought to be. “It’s our turn to do what we want to do,” seems to be the dominant (and nihilistic) sentiment, in each of the two major ethnic groups.
“This is a fatal mistake. If we cannot wake up to the absolute necessity for a neutral state, then we’d better pack up our bags and all leave. The Guyanese state was launched at Independence after massive ethnic violence wrought by squads formed by both the PNC (with CIA backing) and, in response, the PPP (with Cuban/Moscow backing) between 1962-64.
The PNC also received covert support from elements of the police and volunteer forces in that pre-independence struggle and it set a precedent for using those forces for partisan interests. We didn’t seem to have learnt our lesson. Between 1964 and 1992 it has been well documented by numerous credible sources (notably by Professor Ken Danns in his book, Power and Domination in Guyana) that the security forces more-or-less became arms of the PNC. There were also outside forces such as the House of Israel that were used by the PNC to keep opposition forces cowed. Let us not forget that Dr Walter Rodney, by all accounts, was assassinated by a member of the Guyana Defence Force. We still didn’t learn our lesson.
“So today we have the PPP accused of creating its own death squad to go after individuals fingered as “criminals”. Our position, expressed over a week ago, was that the Minister of Home Affairs should recuse himself while an independent Inquiry is conducted into the allegations. We have the word of the Minister that he had conversations with several individuals
now charged with the murder of Bacchus’s brother. The question arises as to why would the Minister, in charge of the security forces of the country, resort to dealing with individuals, each of whom had brushes with the law?
“One explanation, in fact, harks back to the fundamental reason for the political impasse in Guyana – ethnic insecurities. The PPP is a party with deep historical memories. The role of the Disciplined Forces personnel on behalf on the PNC, before and after Independence, could not be brushed aside. The PPP did not have faith in the Disciplined Forces to act professionally, from the moment they took office in 1992. However, rather than doing the right thing and working to instil that professionalism at all costs into those forces, the PPP acted as if everything was
fine and no changes were necessary. The irony was that those forces themselves expected that changes were necessary to return their professionalism after the excesses of the PNC’s regime.
“The main reason that the PPP did not act was that they refused to accept that the fundamental factor underlying Guyana’s politics was race. The forces’ lack of professionalism was underscored by the fact that the PNC had exacerbated the British divide and rule policy by massively increasing the dominance of its African support base within the forces.
“On January 12th 1998, when anti-Indian violence did break out – the PPP was caught with their pants down in terms of providing protection for their supporters. Shown that the Emperor PPP had no clothes, it was not surprising that the violence against Indians intensified. During
1998, dozens of Indians, primarily businessmen, were murdered. In fact ROAR was launched on Jan 17th 1999 at a rally against crime where it issued a detailed proposal for the reform and professionalisation of the forces. I pointed out then that Africans who were silent about the lack of effort of the force to apprehend the murderers were ‘creating a Frankestein that would come back to haunt them.’
“It is apparent now that the PPP, after refusing to professionalise the state institution that was legally responsible for dealing with security – the Police Force – turned to elements of the Black Clothes to take on those who were preying on Indians. We argued at the time that this
approach would backfire. We then witnessed the inevitable excesses of the squad and their dismemberment by their opponents – especially after the infamous 2002 Mash jailbreak.
By now the enterprise had become enmeshed with drug elements and we witnessed two responses – both outside the official state avenue ‒ on which everyone seemed to have given up. These were the ‘Phantom Squad’, apparently sponsored by businessmen who had faced the brunt of the attacks, and a ‘Death Squad’ that had an official, if illegal, imprimatur.
“It is this latter group that appears to have been fingered and for which Minister Gajraj is being blamed. Our contention is that while the depredations against the innocent, especially as we witnessed last year against Indians on the East Coast, have to be dealt with, it serves none of us, even Indians, for that exigency to be handled outside the official state apparatus. This will inevitably come back to haunt all of us.
“The way only forward is to conduct an official Inquiry into the allegations before us and
simultaneously professionalise our Disciplined Forces. We propose a panel of three ex-Chancellors, who are fortunately still around, for the former task. We fortunately also have a Disciplined Forces Commission already functioning, to help us with the latter.”
Yours faithfully,
Ravi Dev
