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The predicament sparked by the Dookie placement
Dear Editor,
Stabroek News editorial of 16th May carried a rebuke of the Acting Commissioner’s decision to place the infamous Deputy Supt Dookie in a posting at Division “A”. The call by Minister Ramjattan that such an officer should be fired, and the fact of his removal from Head of SWAT into administrative leave and then his posting to Division A, mean that action was taken to the limited extent that is possible by his supervisory authority, in the absence of the Police Service Commission.
It does appear that Stabroek News feels that Dookie should be placed in a dog house or probably in charge of the dog house. But that latter would mean getting our Canine Section woozy, knowing what Dookie travels with. We certainly don’t want that.
Where do you post him in the circumstances? This is the difficulty. Where would a Balram Raghubir have placed him? Or a Felix? Or even a Paul Williams whom Felix is lobbying for as he did (and which he was overheard boasting about) at the last National Security Meeting?
Where would Stabroek News have placed him? Well he has now been posted by Paul Williams as Officer in Charge of Force Control, a position regarded as far more sensitive than where he was.
Remember, only the Police Service Commission can discipline Dookie for any wrongdoing. And until that constitutional body is selected and made operational, hardly anything more than shifting him around can be done.
Similarly, the Police Service Commission is the only authority to discipline Supt Wayne De Hearte for the charges pending re the loss of in excess of one kilogram of cocaine from the CID. He, however, went with Minister Ramjattan to Suriname recently as he knows a thing or two about piracy.
Some may consider the recklessness of leaving that quantum of cocaine so carelessly on an open-spaced desk (maybe even deliberately) as being more egregious than the action of Dookie. One is dealing with liquor whilst the other with cocaine. De Hearte presently is acting as second in command in Berbice Division. Not a word concerning this posting.
Again how about the charges against Deputy Supt Withwrite which are pending concerning his tryst with a woman on the seawall which saw him lose a Police Revolver? He is awaiting trial like the other two before the Police Service Commission.
Where do you place him in the meantime? In a dog house too? He is presently posted to the Timehri Subdivision of “A” Division. His wrongdoing saw the loss of a potent weapon into the hands of robbers. In the opinion of some, this may be the most egregious of the three! Again, not a word concerning this posting. Just a deafening silence. What does Felix have to say about this?
I suppose then that the Acting Commissioner’s placement of these three senior officers, conditioned on his predicament of losing so many senior officers on grounds of leave and retirement, and the non-promotion of others in the recent past, is not without justification nor reasonableness.
That is why I write this letter of complaint that Ramnarine is being unfairly treated by your editorial and all those who seek, consequentially, to criticize him for this Dookie affair.
As a former Commissioner in the PSC, I feel it duty bound to say that Stabroek News unjustified comment in that editorial may harm his chances, if it has not done so already. On almost every ground, I feel Ramnarine is presently more qualified than the others. He is the most senior Asst Commissioner by years ahead of all the others; and, he has been performing the functions of Commissioner for well over a year now.
We must not allow Ramnarine’s boastful antagonists on a nit-pick like this to have their way. This type of nit-pick of Ramnarine re Dookie and no criticism of nor nit-pick re De Hearte and Withwrite may have ethnic favouritism behind it. The Police Force will suffer far more with the wrong person appointed on such frivolous nit-picks.
I have hope in the President’s judgement. And wait with bated breath. It will define him.
(Name and address supplied)
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