With the cocaine and gold trafficking out of Guyana in the news – where even ordinary fellas off the streets, so to speak, are in the business big time. Last week in Reg 1’s NW District – Anthony Hosea Beria, called “Negro”; Leroy Williams, a 45-year-old fisherman; two farmers Patrick Sam, 58, and Anthony Lewis, 47, along with Marlon Jerome, a 47-year-old unemployed man – were nabbed for possessing 211.7 kilograms (approximately 465.7 pounds) of cocaine with a street value of $317.5 million!! The 11 cellular phones and three handheld radio sets were incidental since in these matters communication is key!!
Last month, a vessel originating in Guyana was seized over in T&T with 180 kilos or 401 lbs of cocaine. It would seem that 400 to 500 lbs of cocaine are usual shipments for the small man on his way to become a “big man”!! Around the same time, four Guyanese were arrested after 6.3 tonnes of cocaine were found onboard a Guyana-flagged vessel operating all the way off the West African Coast. The owner of the boat – a converted fishing vessel, SOLO – was revealed as Maylene Persaud of 57 Lime and Hadfield streets, Werk-en-Rust. With a street value of at least US$400 MILLION , clearly there aren’t only big men in the cocaine trade, but Big Women!!
On the gold smuggling side – and it’s BiiiiG BUSINESS! – former Minister Trotman had announced that this amounted to some 15,000 ounces (or 468 kilos!!) smuggled WEEKLY. Now apart from us losing billions of dollars in taxes, this smuggling evidently includes “blood gold” from Venezuela mined by Maduro’s Sindicatos!! This has made them appear on the Americans’ radar – especially as this gold ends up in the Middle East where it can be used to fund terrorism!!
But with all this easy money – which dwarfs the percentage we get from our 14.5% of the oil money!! now reaching the ordinary man, we can see where this can all end up by looking at the career of Pablo Escobar who was the founder of the Medellin Cartel operating out of Colombia. Creating a drug monopoly to the US, he became the wealthiest criminal in history, amassing a net worth of about US$30 billion by the time of his death – equivalent to ~$80 billion as of 2025. His luxury house contained a zoo, a lake, a sculpture garden, etc!!
But before he died, he tried to create the image of being a Robin Hood for the folks around Medellin – building housing complexes, parks, football stadiums, hospitals, schools, and churches.
He also launched a political party and entered the Assembly as an alternate member!! But in 1993 he died.
…indifference
As you would know, Dear Reader, your Eyewitness has been asking – nay, PLEADING! – for the longest while for Caricom to step up to the crease on behalf of their fellow member Haiti. Ever since poor President Moïse was assassinated by that Colombian mercenary platoon, the second oldest republic in the hemisphere continued to plummet into the abyss of failed state-ness at the hands of rampaging gangs. So, once again, we hear Caricom leaders wringing their hands about the gangs taking over the country. What’s new??
Are Haitians not men and our brothers?? And aren’t we supposed to be our brother’s keepers?? What was all that fat talk when Haitians were passing through to Brazil to escape the hellhole Haiti had become?? How come all those strident letter writers on behalf of Haitians from back then are now silent?? Jamaica and Bahamas at least sent some token troops to join the African Police.
What’s the rest of Caricom – including Guyana – doing?? Boots on the ground for Haiti!!
…of life
If lawyers are disbarred and priests are defrocked, then are electricians “delighted”;
corpses “decrypted”; cowboys “deranged”; models “deposed”; underwear models “debriefed”; jilted women “debrided”; florists “deflowered”; students “detested”; hostels “debunked”; and spies “debugged” and “detailed”???
