Man appoints and God disappoints

Feb 19, 2020 Letters

---

DEAR EDITOR,

One of the gravest mistakes the APNU+ AFC made when it assumed government almost five years ago was to behave as though the outgoing PPP/C government did nothing to enhance the security sector during its twenty three years in office.
The euphoria evinced and the narrative expounded by spokespersons of the coalition in respect to the security sector was as if Guyana had just achieved its independence and the new kids on the government block had to start from scratch!
The coalition failed to recognize that the legal razor thin 33 to 32 and not their fanciful 34 to 32 seats in parliament was but a mere Pyrrhic victory and that it was only a matter of time before the numbers would drastically change in favour of the opposition.
The coalition could not bring themselves to accept that the best they could have done in the circumstances, was give due recognition to and build on the great strides made by the security sector during the PPP/C’s terms in government.
Instead, the coalition administration chose to focus on the negatives by harping for example on:
*Negative number 1): The so- called period of the “Troubles,” which Mr. Granger had five years to set up a COI to investigate but never did;
*Negative number 2): Trotting out questionable numbers of murders and incidences of crime that could not be validated; and,
*Negative number 3): The phasing out of the Guyana National Service which the then Finance Minister, Carl Greenidge would know, had become a millstone around the necks of Guyanese taxpayers at a time when the country was saddled with a monstrous foreign debt that made Guyana “Uncreditworthy” thanks to the PNC’s economic and financial mismanagement of the economy.
So it was not just a matter of recognizing and reducing the APNU+AFC’s antics in the security sector to the political, on the contrary, it was for all intents and purposes, their unapologetic comfort of living in a surreal world and to kick around the GPF like a political football much to the disapproval of ranks in that organization.
That aside, it is not only Guyanese in general who are in a state of disbelief at the recent statements made by the President at his meeting with the Guyana Veterans’ Legion, In fact, professional ranks within the Joint Services, especially the GPF found their Commander in Chief’s narrative about finding and cleaning up “the mess at the police force” totally shocking, insulting and objectionable.
Added to that is the APNU+AFC’s high command belittling and non-recognition of the GPF’s years of hard work, long before the APNU+AFC’s assumption to office, at improving their level of efficiency in the delivery of service to the public at large. The denigrating of the Force’s efforts came like a hard punch to the stomach of police ranks.
Moreover, having been touched in many tangible ways by the PPP/C’s socio-economic policies, ranks belonging to the Joint Services were appalled at the way they were recently mistreated as a result of an arbitrary political directive ordering the calling off of the 2019 traditional ‘Old Years Nite Balls’ for both the GPF and GDF.
Ranks belonging to the GPF, GPS, GFS and the GDF are flummoxed by statements emanating from the Green House, the Ministry of the Presidency and Pearl claiming they were denied recapitalization and not provided on an annualized basis with the tools, equipment and human resources necessary for them to respond to internal or external threats.
In fact, ranks recall how prior to 1992, the Office of the President and Ministry of Foreign Affairs were provided with more budgetary resources than health, education, GPF, GPS and GFS put together. That was reversed in favour of the less endowed when the PPP came to office in October of the same year. Ever since then, budgetary allocations and other matters relative to the Joint Services have always received keen attention by all subsequent PPP/C administrations.
Tangible and intangible benefits from security sector projects funded directly from the budget under the PPP/C as well as by the donor community contributed enormously to institutional strengthening and human resource capacity of the Joint Service especially the GPF.
More, importantly, the additional one month tax free salary granted to ranks belonging to the Joint Services, once deemed a “bribe” by a Minister is viewed as taking bread from the mouths of families of ranks belonging to the Joint Services.
If this is the mess the President claims to be cleaning up then we can conclude he’s just wasting time. What the President should be doing is building up on what the ranks want and not what he wants. If this is not a clear case of political interference in the GPF then what is?
In this respect, aligning police divisions with the 10 administrative regions mainly for restructuring purposes is bad from a strategic and crime fighting perspective. Not only are the commanders not given adequately trained additional ranks, they are not in receipt of the tools and equipment best suited for the terrain in which are stationed. Clearly, the demographic shifts in criminal activity were not taken into consideration by the architects of the move that was more politically motivated than strategic and tactical.
And the sudden shunting across from Eve Leary to the Department of Citizenship of experienced police officers to do “surveys of the Venezuelan migrant population,” notwithstanding what the affected officers have said, is viewed as another
manifestation on political interference in the operations of the GPF.
Recent statements made by President Granger in respect to the security sector are therefore misplaced.
Mr. Granger must not be reading the editorials of the Stabroek News and Kaieteur News.
In editorials published from time to time, these two newspapers have pointed to the many deficiencies obtaining in the security sector, notably in the Guyana Police Force, the principal law enforcement agency in Guyana.
In this connection, editorials published in Stabroek News editions of December 20, 2019 and February 4, 2020 are instructive.
These are independent, and not political views on the state of affairs obtaining at the GPF which the APNU+AFC has refused to deal with in the same way they have avoided any references to the numerous recommendations contained in the Disciplined Forces Commission Report which Mr. Granger himself participated in formulating.
Incidentally, in his speech to the Guyana Veterans’ Legion, Mr. Granger studiously avoided any reference whatsoever to the numerous recommendations contained in the ‘Report of the Presidential Commission Enquiring into the conditions of veterans from the Guyana Defence Force, the Guyana People’s Militia and the Guyana’ National Service save and except references to what the Commission “examined,” the “establishment of a National Veterans’ Commission” and to “look into the living conditions of veterans and to make recommendations for improvements.”
From 2016 to 2020 not a single recommendation in that report has been implemented.
Finally, should any professional law enforcement organization such as Scotland Yard or the New York Police Department or the Gendarmerie Nationale of France or INTERPOL be commissioned to do a comparative analysis of the performance and delivery of service by the GPF in crime fighting and public safety and security over last five years of the PPP/C’s administration compared to those of the last five years of the APNU+AFC’s the results of that analysis will probably blow the APNU+AFC’s propaganda to smithereens.
Mr Granger is on record claiming that; “There is no way the PPP should be allowed to control security in this country again”.
And that “I cannot put that man in charge of the GDF again! …Right now I’m trying to clean up the mess at the Police Force.”
Mr. Granger appears to be confused over what he has control over as a caretaker President and what he doesn’t have as a Presidential Candidate.
Right now, he is fighting to hold on to power. The PPP/C is fighting to get into power while the peripheral parties are fighting to get a piece of the action.
There is no certainty that Mr. Granger’s self-fulfilling prophecies will be realized. There is no guarantee that he will be the next president of Guyana. Mr. Granger seems to have forgotten that ‘Man appoints and God disappoints.’

Yours faithfully,
Clement J. Rohee

---

---