Madness at the Brickdam Police Station

Feb 26, 2013 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

The concept of a failed state is a hotly debated topic among social scientists. There isn’t consensus among those who study the concept on the cluster of variables to use. There are those who argue that you don’t need the presence of all the characteristics that constitute a failed state.
Take the question of legitimate authority in the State. One set of writers will argue that if there is still a central government that exercises the authority over the sovereign State, then, the country is not a failed state. There are others who go beyond the question of sovereignty. For them, it is the functioning of State organs that are important, not the mere existence of these institutions.
In Guyana, this columnist has long posited that Guyana is a failed state. There has been a massive dysfunction in State organs that began around 2002 and deteriorated to the point that though there is a central government, that repository of power is not coterminous with the society.
State functions have broken down for a long time now in Guyana. The judiciary has been in a shambolic state since the eighties and there is no optimism among citizens that it will return to normalcy in another twenty years.
The school system has totally broken down. Like the judiciary the depression began in the eighties and things have not picked up since. School buildings are in worst conditions than in countries in the throes of civil war.
The massive shortage of teachers gets worse everyday. Even in private schools, there isn’t a quota of teachers. My daughter went to Marian Academy and School of the Nations and had to take extra lessons once “Common Entrance” was approaching.
The security system is in ruins. No country is as unsafe as Guyana. You could be robbed and killed anywhere at any time.
The army has not come up with any major narco-trafficker in the interior where runways for small aircrafts are visible to everyone except the army personnel.
Years ago, I wrote that the mining areas are Chato’s Land. Even Chato’s Land had some civilization about it. Electricity and water supply come at random. The ubiquitous garbage in Georgetown would make a foreign visitor condemn Guyana as a failed state.
Finding a citizen in Guyana that has faith in the police is like looking for elephants in the Botanic Gardens. You are likely to come across an elephant or two quicker than you can find a professional cop. Last Friday, in the Fraud Squad room, I told the four policemen present there that they pay come from two sources – the Government and the rich business class.
About ten years ago, I wrote a trenchant Sunday column on the semi-civilized conditions I saw at the CID offices on the second floor of the Brickdam Police Station. It was horrible to think that a police force in the 21 century could work under those primitive conditions.
Before that article was written, I had concluded that this country was a failed state. If APNU and the AFC can see that, then they would know that they have no business in Parliament.
After I wrote that column, I encountered the present acting Commissioner at an informal get together and he was uncontrollable in his laughter at the way I painted the CID offices. Nothing has changed since then.
Last Friday, Leonard Craig (current chairman of the People’s Parliament) and I took a rape victim (alleged I supposed) to the CID at Brickdam. I called the private media and Red Thread. Karen De Souza arrived first and suggested we see the deputy head of the CID, Mr. Chalmers.
The victim had complained to me and Craig that the police were taking a long time to complete her statement because the CID computer had broken down.
In front of Karen De Souza and Craig and the rape victim, Mr. Chalmers admitted that. I asked him if in the entire building at Brickdam there isn’t another computer and he gave a thin smile and didn’t answer.
The statement was typed on a private laptop and a policewoman went on the road to get it printed. While waiting for Mr. Chalmers to finish his lunch, Craig and I went into the office of the Fraud Squad. I showed all the officers on duty (they were all watching cricket) that wood-ants were eating out their workplace. They responded with cynical reticence.
The CID offices at Brickdam are without phones and not one desk has a computer. The senior officer was drinking a hot Pepsi. I asked him if there was a fridge. His responsive smile was broader that the Brickdam station itself. I wonder if Leroy Brummel will laugh again when he reads this article.

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Madness at the Brickdam Police Station

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