It is not unheard of for circumstances of national crisis or even lesser emergency to bring out the worst in people, not least, manifestations of runaway indifference to important response measures, particularly when these get in the way of our routines. We transgress, as well, when those response protocols are weak and when, as often seems to be the case in Guyana, there is (or at least appears to be) a loss of control by those whose responsibility it is to ‘hold the line.’ There are other circumstances in which problems arise, as has been the case in Guyana, out of what appears to be the granting of official license that provides immunity from having to toe the line.
As was hinted in the preceding paragraph, problems associated with the transgression of the Covid-19 protocols have not all been a question of sudden and inexplicable public pushback against official controls. We are also witnessing what appears to be transgressions of the law in circumstances where the lawbreakers enjoy the prerogative of so doing. In the latter instances, national institutions whose task it is to maintain control, ill-advisedly, for one reason or another, surrender their prerogative after which, of course, they become part of the problem. The national experience of managing the pandemic has been plagued by all of these weaknesses.
One can argue that those instances – like that reported in yesterday’s issue of the Stabroek News – in which ranks of both the Guyana Police Force and the Guyana Defence Force were arrested for attending a party that breached the Covid-19 protocols and which, moreover, was hosted by a member of the GDF – attests to the cesspool of indiscipline and seeming abuse of authority that helps to form the backdrop against which we are managing the pandemic. Here, it seems, is evidence, if indeed such evidence were still needed, that points – in much the same way as the recent behaviour of some representatives of the private sector has done – to the fact that those who might be expected to take the lead in standing behind the enforcement of the law at this time are, in many instances, cynically ‘profiteering’ from a raging pandemic which, whether we like it or not, is threatening to drag us through hell.
The recent Pouderoyen incident resembles a conspiracy amongst members of the Disciplined Services to profiteer from transgressing the protocols. In principle as much as in practice it appears to be identical to the behavioural pattern of those private sector entities in the entertainment industry who offer their services in a manner that disregards the behavioural requirements stipulated in the Covid-19 protocols.
We can now no longer be in any doubt that some of the more important stringencies designed to fend off what is widely believed to be a more virulent ‘second wave’ of COVID-19 are not standing up to the strain of both official and public weaknesses. Whether it be in Casinos, Night Clubs or at ‘speak easy’ bottom house and roadside venues in tucked away communities, there is a thriving ‘market’ for night-time-into-early-morning entertainment, a response to the strictures that impact the high-profile entertainment houses. Patrons, evidently are still prepared to thumb their noses at the threat and, more to the point being made here, appear not to be unduly perturbed by the ‘threat’ posed by police raids and the threat of arrest and prosecution.
Earlier, we had gone through what appeared to be the indifference of the police to the stringent enforcement of ‘curfews’ associated with night-time revelry and what was widely believed to be the preparedness of some of the gatekeepers to look the other way in exchange for ‘a consideration.” We have, it seems, moved on. Last week’s Pouderoyen affair was by no means a precedent in terms of late-night-to-early-morning events that are being labelled ‘police hustles.’ There have also been reports of some of these events occurring in communities on the East Coast Demerara.
After this newspaper had addressed, previously, reports that the behaviour of night time patrols had raised questions as to whether the police were part of the solution or whether aspects of their behaviour were not, in fact, part of the problem, there had been no response, either from the police high command or from the Minister of Home Affairs. This raises a critical question. Do the authorities, specifically, the political administration and the high command of the GPF consider themselves accountable to public opinion or is it just a question of leaving the media to ‘huff and puff’ while they both continue to call it as they alone see it? If the latter is in fact the case, then are we not, in fact, on a hiding to nowhere insofar as the enforcement of the Covid-19 strictures are concerned? What’s the use, one might ask, of us continually ‘bumping our gums’ on the public response to the Covid-19 pandemic in circumstances where it still does not appear that either central government, generally, or the police, specifically, are prepared (or able at this stage) to seriously test themselves against the transgressors. Can this not still be realized through measures that fall well short of transforming the Republic into a police state?
Whether it likes it or not central government has to carry the burden of the can here. It was an error, a considerable one (and this newspaper has said so previously) for the government not to unambiguously admonish the Private Sector Commission for its feral blast against the state-created body set up to monitor transgressions of the Covid-19 protocols. By the same token it was a serious error for the authorities to appear (up until recently, seemingly) to take a public position on the allegation that the Sleepin Casino had been in breach of the Covid-19 protocols. After all, the popular argument went, you place yourself in a decidedly awkward position if you ‘run down’ the average community supermarket for going beyond the stipulated trading hours, on the one hand and on the other, operate in such a matter as to cause it to seem as though the laws do not apply to other more prominent private sector places of business.
What happened at Pouderoyen recently is not news, it is simply a continually emerging microcosm of a wider problem. Profiting from a condition of a wider emergency or crisis is not unheard of, either here in Guyana or elsewhere in the world. In this instance it would appear that there are individuals who enjoy a measure of authority in a particular circumstance and have chosen to exercise their authority to their personal gain. There is nothing unusual about that.
There are other ‘Pouderoyens’ that we have heard of on the East Coast and elsewhere. What are believed to exist in multiple numbers too are other well-placed transgressors of the Covid-19 protocols that continue to benefit from exemption from the requirement of living within the law.
Enforcement will never be really effective except we arrive at a point, and quickly, where there is one law for all. The problem here is that there is the considerable possibility that we could pay with lives for our prevarication on this issue.
