Minister’s party support for him cannot wash away his non-performance

Aug 15, 2017 Letters

Dear Editor,
This APNU/AFC coalition government has had a tremendous lot to clean up administratively since attaining office in 2015. Several measures have been put in place to ensure that government departments’ function and businesses find it easier to function. But even with these developments more needs to be done. One area where President Granger could be decisive in making changes to ensure that his administration maximizes its policy decisions is an evaluation of his Ministers performance.
I am sure that the President must be aware of the letters and comments in the press and social media on the performance of two of his ministers Messrs Basil Williams, Attorney General and Khemraj Ramjattan, Minister of Public Security. I will not address the issues relation to the Attorney General in this letter, suffice it to say that to date he has had no success in the High Court on any of the issues he has presumably advised the President on. Mr Williams’ tenure thus far has been defined by failure after failure. The most recent is the President advising the Police Service Commission (most likely on Mr Willams’ recommendation) to hold all promotions of senior police officers in violation of the Constitution as is recorded in the press.
The reason why I have highlighted the Police Service Commission matter is because it is related to the performance of the Minister of Public Security. Since being assigned this portfolio Minister Ramjattan has done little to reassure the public that they are secure. Road accidents and violent crimes continue to skyrocket and corruption in the police force continues unabated at the highest levels, just read the evidence being collected at the Commission of Inquiry looking into the alleged plot to assassinate the President.
But to top this all off is the Minister’s stewardship of the Prison Service. In 2016 sixteen inmates were incinerated and a section of the prison was destroyed by fire, and a Commission of Inquiry was established to look into the circumstances that led to the horrible situation. This Commission made several recommendations many of which were organizational in nature and would not have entailed any financial expenditure, yet there is no evidence that these recommendations were even read by the Minister.
As a result, in 2017, the mother of all calamities occurred at the ancient Georgetown Prisons. It was burnt to the ground and an officer murdered after a riot by prisoners and several of those prisoners escaped including some of the most dangerous inmates who are still probably wandering the countryside. The aftermath of this fire is the stuff for the Link Show, with the stories of the prisoners in the Lusignan swamp butchering their own cattle and eventually burrowing out for a few nights of freedom. Through all of this the Minister rejects personal responsibility and his supervisor, President Granger slaps him on the back for his performance.
Now we come to the issue of the promotion of police officers and the President’s unconstitutional act. In most normal circumstances an able and diligent Minister would have requested to see a copy of the list of officers to be promoted from the Police Commissioner whom he supervises. He would have perused the list with his senior advisors for any issues that may lie within and advised Cabinet on those issues. All of this would have occurred long before the list is sent to the Police Service Commission and the president finds himself once again in another constitutional conundrum.
In this case Minister Ramjattan cannot claim that payments to the sugar industry resulted in this inefficiency as he has in the case of the prison fire. Indeed, no one can be blamed for this situation but Mr. Ramjattan himself despite the recent machinations coming from his political party.
Keith Branch

Discover more from Kaieteur News

Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.

Latest News