Guyana: Lawlessness in a failed state

Nov 05, 2009 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

I am not going to debate any spin doctor paid by the Office of the President to propagandize for the Guyana Government. Such exchanges will get nowhere.
My article last week that Guyana is a failed state was timely. Look at what has happened to the 14-year-old in police custody. Indeed Guyana has become a failed state and I believe that we are in the disintegration process. The question that must be asked is when is the Government going to fall?
If the Americans keep up the pressure which has begun with the cancellation of the visa of Kwame McCoy by the US Embassy then we may see a collapse of the PPP regime.
I am not optimistic about a sudden resort to democracy by the Guyana Government after this torture scandal.
My feeling is that they are going to proceed with violent beatings of arrested people anyway, but in future episodes they will be more careful. If accused victims are too badly tortured, they may finish them off before they face another torture scandal. The resort to democracy cannot happen. The leaders in the Guyana Government have degenerated to the point where they are helpless victims of tyrannical instincts.
There can be no pulling back. This is the pattern dictatorships follow – one bad thing leads to another then a shameless face is put on it, and things just keep sliding.
The greatest fear all Guyanese should have is the conspiratorial plots of violence to distract from the disintegration process. I have two takes on the Health Ministry fire. One was that it was a stratagem to take the heat off Minister Ramsammy. It could also be that documents too incriminating, existed in that building and the opportunity presented itself when a demonstration followed the arrest of Benschop and Lewis.
Now we have the shooting up of Brickdam Police Station, the High Court and Richard Ishmael Secondary School. Strange how these attacks come right in the middle of nasty moments of embarrassment for the Government.
The Health Ministry fire occurred when evidence was mounting that Dr Leslie Ramsammy was a working partner of Shaheed ‘Roger’ Khan. Now after a torture case that is making news worldwide and a possible revocation of the visa of top political elites, we read about gunmen going on a rampage.
Funny thing is that just about four hours after the Ministry of Health fire, the police knew who they were looking for. An important factor that should be given consideration in the configuration of things is whether these attacks on state institutions is not a strategy to force the Americans to back down in the visa policy because the US officials may see that there is a violent conspiracy that intends to devastate the elected government in Guyana
I doubt that it will deter the Americans. The State Department officials have more evidence against the Guyana Government that we may ever know. The Kwame McCoy visa abrogation has more implications than we are aware of at the moment. Once McCoy had his visa taken away, then logical deduction would tell you that more PPP officials will be hauled in. The reasoning is simple. McCoy was not charged. He was not interdicted from duty. He was not reprimanded by his President.
What then did the US Embassy have to go on? The Americans knew that immoralities and criminalities inside the Guyana Government will not be visited with a disciplinary hand by the political directors. The Americans aren’t going to ask for explanations because they know they will get none from the Presidential Secretariat and Freedom House. But they can use the visa avenue to pressure the political elites.
This is a policy that has begun. My contention is that if on a thin case like McCoy, the Americans can institute a travel embargo then why not on others where the evidence is more graphic? It is not that I believe McCoy is not the person on the tape. The legal standpoint is that he has not been proven to have committed a crime either by the courts or the government for whom he works yet the Americans moved against him.
The logics are plain to see – the Americans are going to clip the wings of powerful political figures in Guyana that have committed moral, legal and criminal atrocities here. Given that the torture of that little boy is a violation of international law, one would expect there to be visa denial for at least the Commissioner of Police and the Home Affairs Minister.
We must not forget that the Americans may now be prepared to move against the Jagdeo Government over the Roger Khan affair.

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