6 years for violent robbery/murder? Really!

Mar 12, 2022 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

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It really gets me angry and when I say angry, I mean insanely emotional. For decades now, lots of wrong things have taken place in this society. You hear not a word from any type of organisation. Then you discover that Guyana has human rights groups, women groups, transparency/accountability groups, government watchdog groups, anti-corruption groups, constitutional protection groups, and the enumeration is longer than the Essequibo River.
The reverberation of these formations take in the entire country when it is something the government does. Is there a more absurd country than Guyana? Can you imagine a Guyanese who lives in another country and teaches at one of the universities of that country (mind you, not at UG where the service is vitally needed) appeared before an international body and requested its intervention to stop oil operations here?
Social activist, Jonathan Yearwood was dismayed by that action. He wrote a letter in the press asking the powerful question. You can ask for a better type of contract for oil operation but not stopping the process. This is the kind of aberrations I, as an opinion-maker, academic and social activist have to endure in my country.
In the meantime, oceans of wrong things happen here and the society is silent. You don’t hear a word from the plethora of the “civil society” entities we have. You look back at this country and the injustices are countless. And guess why the plethora of “civil society” people are silent? The issues involve ordinary folks and there is no publicity to be had only when the topics are about government’s behaviour.
Do you know on three occasions in the past, ordinary, poor men, have been sentenced to three years of imprisonment for possession of a smoking utensil? Not even in Malaysia and the Philippines where the sentencing is draconian would that happen. Do you know an ordinary, Amerindian fellow found a spent shell on the road, was charged and sentenced to two years? Please see my column of Thursday, February 15, 2018, “Jail for spent shell: We are heading for another bloody mayhem.”
When these injustices occur where is the ocean of “civil society groupings? Maybe we will see them now that an unbelievably light sentence for robbery and murder has been made public. Taxi driver, Faizal Bacchus along with two others, was charged with the murder of a businessman in, July 2015. On a guilty plea, Bacchus was given an 18-year sentence.
Because of various considerations, Bacchus was released last week. If the robbery and murder were committed in July 2015 and Bacchus was freed at the beginning of March 2022, then this violent convict spent just over six years in jail. Let’s see the circumstances under which the businessman died through the words of his wife as contained in her testimony.
This is what is reported in the press: “In a tearful recount of the events of that fateful night, the man’s widow, Chitrakha Ramlall had told the court that she had just opened the door for her husband after he arrived home, when she was alerted to loud explosions. The wife told the court that as her husband did on any other night, he called and told her that he was on his way home and after coming out of bed, she proceeded to the living room where she waited for him. She recalled that after his arrival sometime after midnight, he parked his vehicle and she opened the door to let him in the house and then proceeded to the upper flat of their home. No sooner had she gotten upstairs, Ramlall said she heard “bullet” and her husband shouting “Thief! Thief!” She said she immediately called out to neighbours who went to her assistance. In between sobs, the woman had said that after rushing back downstairs she saw her husband lying face-down on the ground and stripped of his gold and diamond jewellery.”
This is Guyana where nothing makes sense and everything is senseless. This is Guyana where Sigmund Freud is proven right each day. Freud wrote that motive and action must be connected. You put your item in front of the cashier. That is action. The motive is you want that item to use. Where there is a disconnection between motive and action, then disaster looms. Disaster arrived in Guyana a long time ago.
A man spends less than seven years for his participation in the vicious murder/robbery of a businessman. There is no condemnation. The crabs will crawl out of the barrel today, this very day, looking for their accustomed publicity when the minister opens his/her mouth and says something wrong. I guess that is what crabs do – they crawl.
(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of this newspaper.)

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