CANU to set up branch in Berbice

The Customs Anti-Narcotics Unit (CANU) is to set up an office in Berbice, and Public Security Minister Khemraj Ramjattan has said the new office will be housed in one of the buildings belonging to the Guyana Sugar Corporation (GuySuCo).
The Upper Corentyne has in the past been used as a trans-shipment point for illegal drugs trafficking between Guyana and Suriname. The Police have established that much of the marijuana cultivated along the Berbice River and at some sections of the Canje River are shipped to neighbouring Suriname.
Addressing some Corentyne residents recently, Ramjattan said the CANU unit would help strengthen the Berbice Police Division which has been diligently working to combat the problem.
“We need to have this up and running very shortly, so that we can have this core set of people to deal solely with the apprehension of drug traffickers; and these are persons who have had intense training to deal with such problems,” he stated.
In an interview with this publication, Ramjattan explained that there has been an increased amount of interceptions of illicit substances in Berbice.
“I have been getting the reports, that is why I have asked that we send some more CANU officers to Berbice,” he told this publication.
Less than a week ago, 50 pounds of marijuana were tossed out of a moving car on the West Coast of Berbice.
In recent months, several persons have appeared before courts in Berbice on charges of trafficking in narcotics, and many of them have been jailed for the offence. The Police have also conducted several drug eradication exercises in the Berbice River area.
“There have also been reports of drug interdictions and some eradication exercises at the back of New Amsterdam, where one set of dope is being planted; so it is important that we get information from the public. We also will do our surveillance to catch these criminals, and then prosecute them and then lock them up,” Ramjattan told this publication.
While addressing the Corentyne residents, he told them that from the reports he has been receiving, the police have been doing a great job in trying to deal with this drug issue. “…which seems to have increased in the Berbice area.” The Public Security Minister noted. “Once dope is being planted and sold and trafficked, then we need to quickly nip this in the bud, to prevent it from turning from bad to worse.
“Some of the big ones we want to lock up. The guys with the little spliff, [a cannabis cigarette] we have to have some alternative sentencing policy for them, because we don’t want to pack out jails again with people with one joint or anything like that. So it is important that we get the whole framework understood. In any event, those guys that are planting it and then transporting it in compact ways, we want to get them; so the effort is going to be improved to catch them.”
The minister told the Guyana Times, “We need to have this up and running very shortly, so that we can have this core set of people to deal solely with the apprehension of drug traffickers, and these are persons who have had intense training to deal with such problems,” the minister said.
He said the CANU unit would help strengthen the Berbice Police Division, which has been diligently working to combat the problem.
CANU was established in an effort to assist in curbing narco-trafficking. The Berbice CANU office will be a part of the National Anti-Narcotics Agency (NANA).
NANA is a collaboration of intelligence from CANU, the Guyana Revenue Authority’s Drug Enforcement Unit and the Guyana Police Force’s Narcotics Section.
NANA is a policy-making body.