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Blame the Government – Intelligence-led operation is paying off

Jun 11, 2008 Peeping Tom

The Joint Services scored limited success over the weekend by once more disrupting the lives of the members of the so-called Buxton gang and killing one of the members.

This time the operation took place miles from the coast in the heart of the jungle at a location virtually unknown to the vast majority of Guyanese.
The government said a long time ago that in its fight against crime and particularly the armed gang that has been wreaking havoc in the country, its operations would be intelligence driven.

People who love to blame the government argued that the government was only concentrating in Buxton and that it did not take too much intelligence to maintain a military presence in a village that produced some of the best brains in the country.
There were sporadic raids and arrests, all of which drew criticisms from those who seek to blame the government for everything but while some innocent people were detained there were also people who knew more than they would readily admit. It is clear that no innocent person was charged and placed before the courts and all those arrested have since been released.
The government had appealed to the main opposition party to come out and to help in the fight against crime; it called on the PNCR to declare that Buxton was being used as a haven for criminals. These calls were not heeded. Instead the government was attacked for targeting the less fortunate in Buxton.
It is now known that the most recent gunman to be killed was a Buxtonian and the government had long known that the gunmen had been recruiting young men in the village. It was this knowledge that prompted the raids and the limited detention for the purpose of questioning.
Further proof of the intelligence-led operation was had this past weekend. Under no circumstance could the Joint Services have tracked the criminal gang to that remote part of the interior without information from some of the very people detained and from those in the communities who want to live in a peaceful Guyana.
The government is sparing no pains in catching these gunmen.

Even now, large detachments are in the interior on the trail of the gunmen who have vowed to create even more panic in the country. A diary found in the camp has provided irrefutable proof that the gunmen were responsible of the massacres in Lusignan and Bartica. The evidence was clear.
But what is even more frightening is the plan to execute another massacre. Intelligence had suggested that this third massacre would have occurred during the hosting of CARIFESTA as part of a programme to embarrass the government. Indeed the embarrassment would have been great but worse, another community would have been traumatized.
There are regular police roadblocks and while there have not been political criticisms of these roadblocks there have been complaints.

Such actions cost money and when people complain about there not being expenditure in certain areas, instead of blaming the government they should take a step back and recognize that their very survival depends on the expenditure in these areas.
There is one point that keeps escaping the critics and it is the polarization in the political arena.

The government is convinced that if there had been cooperation at the political level, the current criminal enterprise would have ended. Instead there was the blame game that has had serious consequences.
The government has sought the cooperation of its neighbour, Suriname, because there is the suspicion that the gunmen may flee to that country.
The criminals are not all that are attracting the attention of the government. There is the fight against rising prices and the decline in education. All these things are being tackled at the same time.

It is not a source of joy that gasoline has reached $1,000 a gallon and that transportation is costing more.
The money being spent to corner the gunmen could have been better spent if only the political opposition had joined forces with the government when the appeal was made.

This was not to be and the opposition parties, the PNCR in particular, decided to walk the streets and further disrupt national life.

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