Things about Guyana, the Caribbean Police Commissioners should know

May 13, 2009 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

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President Bharrat Jagdeo spoke to another formal gathering, recently, and as usual, the weak points of his delivery are glaringly manifest. If there is one Police Commissioner in the Caribbean region that should know a thing or two about Guyana it is the officer from Jamaica.
During the signing of the EPA, Prime Minister Golding lashed at Guyana without mentioning a specific name. But even a schoolboy would know which government Mr. Golding had in mind.
I hold to the inflexible opinion and deeply-felt belief that Mr. Golding meant Guyana under President Jagdeo.
The Jamaican PM said that there is a country in Caricom that is a panhandler. It goes around the world begging for resources and proclaiming how poor it is to attract aid. Mr. Golding intoned that he finds that unacceptable.
This reminder of what the Jamaican leader asserted should be juxtaposed alongside some remarks of the President at the opening of the Association of Caribbean Police Commissioners’ Conference on Monday. Continuing with his favourite theme that the developed world needs to treat the Third World with more respect, Mr. Jagdeo again called for a relationship between the West (he meant the US) and the developing world, based on equal partnership.
Mr. Jagdeo is engaged in a Sisyphean endeavour. He needs to read the oldest book written on International Relations, Thucydides: “The Peloponnesian Wars” penned more than two thousand years ago.
Large, rich states will not treat small, poor territories as respected partners because they are not. Powerful countries that have to patronage weak ones will not extend such a generous conceptualization.
This has been the nature of international relations long before the world became modern. When impoverished countries have to live off the hand-outs of wealthy nations, respect will not be forthcoming.
Using the HIPC framework, Guyana was listed as belonging to a group of the eleven poorest in the world and that is how it got substantial debt write-off by the G7 during the reign of British PM, Tony Blair.
Guyana is constantly begging multilateral agencies for even the smallest amount of assistance. Last year the Ministry of Home Affairs asked the IDB for a mere $US3 million for an education programme among poor, urban youths.
Most of these international lending houses are dominated by the voting power of the US. The IDB, of which the US is the biggest contributor, is a vital source of income for this country. I remember in 2000, a certain powerful leader in government used the work “peaking” in reference the election the next year.
He said by the time the election comes around, he has hundreds of millions of IDB money to spend thus guaranteeing re-election. I heard the words for myself.
The piper will have to play the tunes that are requested of him because he is being paid to play the songs. The payer may treat him with contempt because he is the paymaster.
Mr. Jagdeo in his speech, referred to Colombia getting more anti-narcotic assistance than the combined Caricom group.
What the President didn’t tell the Caribbean Police Commissioners is that the US is not satisfied with Guyana’s effort at catching drug traffickers.
Colombia has a better track record, one that makes Guyana look very badly in the eyes of the US.
The President would have been out of protocol if he had told the Police Commissioners that the US has several sealed indictment for suspected drug traffickers here but the US has not shared the information with their Guyanese counterparts.
The names are not known to Government officials and police authorities in Guyana. The Police Commissioners should know that no big traffickers have been arrested on Guyanese soil. Of those several indictments, two have been taken in custody by the DEA when they were on foreign lands.
For the umpteen time, Mr. Jagdeo made the point that the US is the focal point for drugs leaving foreign destinations. In his speech to the Police Commissioners he added money laundering to his customary accusation. Everyone in the world knows that.
Mr. Jagdeo is on solid ground whenever he makes that accusation. But the US and Colombia have a record of catching drug traffickers and money-launderers. We have a comical record of catching “mules” all the time but never the big fishes. Is it possible these sharks have powerful friends that protect them in their operations in Guyana?
Let’s hope the Police Commissioners discuss corruption. It would be interesting to examine Guyana’s balance-sheet on corruption. Surely, those Commissioners have seen powerful politicians in their respective countries brought before the law.
In Guyana, corrupt politicians are what we in the media refer to as The Untouchables.

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