…now you don’t
Here we go again. The new Police Commish has joined his erstwhile civilian boss – Public Security Minister Ramjattan – to trot out statistics to put the minds of the citizenry to rest on the issue of crime. He insists crime is “down” and Guyanese are just being fooled by dastardly forces who insist otherwise. Presumably such as the Private Sector Commission.
Now it could be that the people of Guyana are just hallucinating. If so, your Eyewitness hopes they’ve been reassured by the statistics from the alarmists out to spoil the sterling reputation of the Police Force. But your Eyewitness does think the Commish is playing fast and loose with the facts when he compares the present crime rate with the numbers between 2002-2008 he cites.
He illustrated why folks snarl about “lies, damned lies and statistics”. Statistics are meaningless without their context. And we hope the Commissh hasn’t forgotten that in those years, the country was held hostage by five criminals holed up in Buxton, from which locale they committed murders, arson, robberies, kidnapping and general mayhem on the surrounding communities – and further afield.
And we certainly hope he hasn’t forgotten in those years, more Policemen were murdered than in all the years since the formation of the force in 1839! And they were killed because the five gunmen, who’d broken out of the Camp Street Jail, had declared war against the state as “African Resistance Fighters”.
At least 10 massacres were committed during those years by the gunmen – who were all eventually gunned down by 2008. In the meantime, according to Roger Khan, a self-confessed drug smuggler, he helped to put down the threat and worked closely with elements of the Police Force, including one of the present Commish’s predecessors.
This was all political violence and we can’t believe the Commish would be so contemptuous of the intelligence of the Guyanese people. But let’s pose some other statistics to the Commish and his civilian boss. Looking at murders alone, in the decade between 1990-1999, 1100 persons were murdered – an average of 110 annually. So can we say that’s a base figure, even though we know that in 1998-99 alone 30 businessmen had been targeted and killed by bandits.
Now in the decade within the Commish’s citation (2000-2009) 1431 murders have been committed – an average of 143 annually. So, can we call this number “extraordinary” because of all the killings committed by the Buxton gunmen, gangsters, etc?
So what does the Commish say when the total murders between 2011 to 2015 is 875 for an average of 146?
Even higher than the years of the killing fields!!
…now it’s revised
Your Eyewitness is surprised Tacuma Ogunseye defended Prezzie’s speech referring to “the troubles” but laid the killings and rapes and robberies solely at the feet of the PPP and “drug lords”. He’s reminded of the words of Bob Dylan: “How many times can a man turn his head/ and pretend that he just doesn’t see?”
Didn’t the “troubles” begin with the refusal of the PNC to concede losing the elections of 1997? Wasn’t Buxton taken over by five prison escapees after violent protests and became a haven of “political sophisticates” – as called by Eusi Kwayana – who had to flee the village? Didn’t they call themselves “Resistance Fighters” on behalf of African Guyanese? And in retaliation for some high handed actions by the Police, declared war on that organisation and killed them like flies? Didn’t the COP “head” off his Minister from the Agricola Massacre?
“Yes, and how many deaths will it take ‘til he knows that too many people have died? The answer, my friend, is blowin’ in the wind.”
…and now it’s revealed?
There is a God!! Right after Ogunseye’s letter, one of Fineman’s gang confessed as to their role in the Bartica Massacre.
Let’s see them lay THIS at the feet of the PPP!!
