Slackness and corruption permeate Guyana’s private security sector

Dear Editor,
Slackness and corruption permeate all levels of Guyana’s private security services sector, and this situation was cruelly exposed by the media last week when news broke that a security guard who was involved in a public altercation with Minister Simona Broomes last month is a jailbird who has served time in the US for gun-related offences and drug crimes.
People all across Guyana are scratching their heads and trying to wrap their minds around news reports that this guard is a deportee and ex-convict named Robert Goodluck, a.k.a. Robert Wren, who not only beat the system to get hired as a guard, but was also able to get himself appointed as a supernumerary constable and pass the Police background check for a precept to bear firearms.
Anyone who is shocked that a deportee who was jailed in the US for manslaughter and crimes involving drugs ended up as a security officer with a precept squabbling with a Government Minister will be blown away to find out that a bail-jumper and fugitive from American justice heads a local security firm, and in 2016 became secretary/treasurer of a major security association, of which I was a co-founder, chairman, secretary, and president.
Because of these kinds of shenanigans, I prefer to keep my distance from that association.
Something stinks to high heavens in the local private security services system. It took the incident with Minister Broomes to get the Police to do a proper background check on Goodluck and belatedly discover the security officer’s criminal background.
How was Goodluck able to get around a Police background check? By simply applying for a precept under his other name? Isn’t that one of the oldest tricks in the book? Since the Police were able to find Goodluck’s criminal record quite easily after the Broomes incident, how come they couldn’t find it before? Didn’t they do the same check when his name was first submitted for a precept? This is either slackness or corruption; pure and simple.
How many others have slipped through the cracks in our gun-licensing system because of negligence or skullduggery?
The same slackness and corruption that infest the issuing of firearm licences exist in other areas of the private security services sector. The fault does not necessarily lie with the Office of the Commissioner of Police. I believe the system is failing because an evil bureaucracy is stifling the local security industry, and this monster is made up of officials who are clueless, or corrupt, or both.
If you look at the recent known cases: of a fugitive heading a security company and holding high office in a security association and an ex-felon getting a precept to bear firearms, it is hard to believe that an official Guyana Security Service Act is in place. But the local security sector is in such disarray right now that this Act is now nothing more than a paper tiger that nobody bothers with anymore.
The cold, hard fact is: we have a Security Services Act in place, and it gives the Office of the Commissioner of Police wide powers to enforce it and monitor all operatives in the industry. So, how in the world did a fugitive from American justice — for bail-jumping and narcotics-related crimes — get permission to set up a private security company and get elected to high office in a security association?
The answer is simple: the system is completely broken down because some persons in authority have been compromised by favours and bribes. I can state this openly without fear of contradiction. Google it and you will see that this fugitive fled American justice since 2009, to live here with impunity. Both the previous administration and the current Government know this, and have done nothing.
Certain individuals across administrations have given this fugitive big business plus protection. Despite the owner being wanted for serious crimes in the US, this person’s company gets huge security contracts, and his pockets are bulging with taxpayers’ dollars. But he knows how to manipulate persons in high office, and has made some of them shareholders and directors in his company.
The National Insurance Scheme (NIS) was forced to publish his company’s name in the newspapers because he was not paying up contributions to the scheme. Furthermore, this wanted person’s workers staged a massive public protest, claiming that they are not being paid and their Pay As You Earn (PAYE) taxes were not being remitted.
But that is not all: this individual was hauled before the Guyana courts for trafficking cocaine in fish. The same US fugitive was charged and appeared in our courts, but the Police were embarrassed because the case jacket disappeared. Yet, despite a background steeped in suspicious behaviour, this fugitive got a personal firearm licence, and is licensed to operate a private security service with armed personnel.

No wonder people are saying all over the place that Guyana’s system of awarding gun licences is so lax that known criminals, fugitives from American justice, severely depressed persons, and even psychopaths can beat the system and get firearm licences.
In recent times, highly suspicious persons who are well-connected to ‘big’ ones’ in society have been able to acquire large arsenals of weapons through pseudo-legitimate channels. I recall a bizarre case not long ago, when a well-known businessman went on a shooting spree in a Georgetown street and several persons, including the gunman, ended up dead. In the ensuing news reports, persons at the scene claimed that everyone knew the man was deranged and wanted to know how he got so many guns, apparently with the approval of a particular former Commissioner of Police.
Something is seriously wrong when people who are known fugitives from the law and persons of suspicious character can set up private security services and get gun licences willy-nilly. It is even worse when such characters can get protection from persons in power. With such powerful protection, they can become emboldened to do serious criminal acts.
Private security services are a sensitive law enforcement arm of the country. Their value relies upon effective scrutiny of their owners and personnel, as well as proper and timely monitoring of their operation. It is highly dangerous when totally unsuitable and undesirable persons can infiltrate this sector and get away with it.
God knows how many trigger-happy criminals, ‘loose cannons’ and outright lunatics have gotten gun permits because slackness and corruption have penetrated the system; and they are out there with both the means and opportunity to create terror, murder and mayhem in other people’s lives.

Sincerely,
Roshan Khan Sr