PPPC is misleading Guyanese on the national security strategy

Jan 06, 2013 APNU Column, Features / Columnists

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Minister of Home Affairs Clement Rohee’s press conference on 31st December 2012 promised to make announcements on security reform. The public was presented instead with a selective review of some incremental security sector changes which, though necessary, are insufficient to reduce the incidence of the most violent and virulent crimes.
The Government of Guyana needs to introduce, as a matter of urgency, a serious security strategy to protect our citizens from criminal violence.
A Partnership for National Unity is of the view that the People’s Progressive Party Civic administration is misleading the public by fiddling with the security sector and playing with new labels instead of implementing ‘root-and-branch’ reforms.
Proposals have been made, for example, to change the names of the three services to the Guyana Police Service, Guyana Fire and Rescue Service and Guyana Correctional Service, respectively. The nice new names will not necessarily improve the performance, enhance the professionalism or alter the public perception of these services.
It is clear, also, that some measures – re-introduction of two separate “E” & “F” Police Divisions; re-introduction of Traffic Wardens on the streets of Georgetown, re-establishment of an aeronautical branch and re-drafting of a National Drug Strategy Master Plan – are not new at all. These existed before and were allowed to lapse or were changed without success.
Rohee’s statement seemed to suggest that the emphases of the reforms will be in four areas: Administration, aimed at strengthening the Administration of the Guyana Police Force with particular reference to standards for recruitment and retention of staff; Succession Planning, aimed at developing a sustainable approach to succession planning with particular reference to career planning and retention of cadet officers; Integrity-Probity (professionalization), aimed at improving the Professionalism of the  Force through strengthening its accountability and instigating a more rigorous approach to development of integrity; and Public Relations-Communications, aimed  at developing a sustainable approach to public relations-communications with particular reference to a modern and responsive approach to dealing with the media and other internal and external stakeholders.
The Partnership accuses Minister of Home Affairs, Clement Rohee, of deliberately avoiding references to the high rate of armed robberies, contraband-smuggling, gun-running, money-laundering, narcotics-trafficking, people-trafficking, piracy and banditry plaguing the country.
The Minister’s so-called ‘plan’ failed to provide assurances that human safety will be enhanced and police conduct and performance will be improved.
A Partnership for National Unity has studied Rohee’s statement and has determined that it would not be in a position to endorse or support the proposals without examining the Capita-Symonds consultancy Report which seemed to be the basis of those changes. APNU demands, therefore, that the Capita-Symonds Report – which was handed over to Rohee 22 months ago in March 2011, and now forms the basis of the new ‘plan’ – be laid before the National Assembly.
It should also be published in the media so that the public could read its contents and assess its relevance to crime fighting and the improvement of the efficiency and effectiveness of the Guyana Police Force.
APNU points out that there has been no shortage of so-called plans for security sector reform by the PPPC administration over the past 12 years. These efforts, however, have been deliberately derailed and not one of them has been fully implemented. Some of these plans are:
·    1999. The British Regional Adviser, Paul Matthias, visited Guyana, conducted a study of policing and produced a report making recommendations for improvement.
·    2000. The British Department for International Development-funded  consultants “  Symonds Group Limited “ released their report on the Guyana Police Force in November 2000.
·    2002. President Bharrat Jagdeo promulgated a “menu of measures” claiming that they would improve the police force’s crime-fighting capacity. Jagdeo actually went to London to meet the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police to seek British assistance.
·    2003. The British government sent the Defence Advisory Team to Georgetown to conduct a study of the security sector. The team’s report recommended measures to enhance the Police Force’s capability.
·    2004. The Disciplined Forces Commission, under the chairmanship of Justice Ian Chang, presented its report to the National Assembly containing 164 recommendations for the Police Force and other security sector reforms.
·    2005. The British Scottish Police College conducted a series of management training programmes. It presented the Guyana Police Force Strategic Plan in partnership with the Inter-American Development Bank as part of the Guyana Citizens Security Programme.
·    2006. British Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, Baroness Valerie Amos, and President Jagdeo agreed to a Statement of Principles which formed the basis on which the British Department for International Development proceeded with a fresh consultancy. A new British-funded security sector reform team visited, in October 2006, and integrated various local and foreign initiatives into a holistic strategy. The PPPC administration adopted a Citizen Security Programme which was to be funded by a US$19.8 million loan from the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB).
·    2007. British High Commissioner, Fraser Wheeler, and Head of the Presidential Secretariat, Dr. Roger Luncheon, signed an Interim Memorandum of Understanding for a Security Sector Reform Action Plan in August 2007.
·    2009. The British Government decided to abandon the negotiations with the Guyana Government of Guyana for the £ 4.9M Security Sector Reform Action Plan in the face of unprincipled resistance by the PPPC administration to previously-agreed guidelines.
·    2010. Clement Rohee stated: “Guyana has no desire to have any resident experts in our country at this point in time [nor] …in the not too distant future either…We have enough experts here in Guyana in the police force, in the security sector…So we don’t need a foreign expert to come and tell us… In fact we have already gone a very far way with the reforms so I don’t know what we need an expert to tell us about…when it comes to bringing experts to Guyana for the security sector that is a no go.”
·    2011. The British consultancy firm – Capita-Symonds – presented the final draft of the strategic plan for the modernisation of the Guyana Police Force to the Home Affairs Ministry, on Thursday 29 March 2011.
·    2012.  Clement Rohee made a statement to a Press Conference, on 31st December 2012, outlining recommendations contained in the Capita-Symonds Report.
A Partnership for National Unity makes it clear that it supports the implementation of a serious security sector reform programme to enhance human safety. The Partnership iterates its previously-stated support for reforms based, essentially, on the recommendations of the Disciplined Forces Commission and the Security Sector Reform Action Plan both of which the People’s Progressive Party Civic administration failed to implement over the past nine years.

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