Sugar expenditure not a factor in prison break

Dear Editor,

Public Security Minister Khemraj Ramjattan has reportedly stated that Government spending money on the sugar industry was the main reason why enough funds were not available to upgrade and improve prison conditions or the prison itself. People I have spoken to query whether corruption, wastage, salary increases for Ministers, and general misspending of money are not factors that led to diverting scarce resources from the prison and other critical projects? And they also ask whether scholarships for Ministers, the corrupt drug bond, $500K a month rental for housing for Ministers are not factors that short changed the prisons and the sugar industry?

As I travel around, in conversations, people almost unanimously disagree with the explanation offered by Public Security Minister Ramjattan for not upgrading the Camp Street Prison, because of his claim that “the money was largely spent on the sugar industry.”

People feel the Minister would have been better off not offering a comment or explanation for the riot rather than make that poor excuse for the deteriorating conditions in the prison that led to the riot and jail break.

People say the Government has not implemented the recommendations of the Commission of Inquiry into the last prison riot a year ago. People are very fearful for their lives as a result of the jailbreak and blame the Government for the current state of affairs regarding prison conditions. Almost everyone is concerned about the crime situation, saying the Government seems unable or incapable of addressing it.

Current and former sugar workers say the sugar industry has nothing to with the prison riot. A bulk of the sugar industry money has come from grants from the European Union (EU) rather than from national revenues. But the sugar workers have not seen the money. The sugar industry and its workers have been taken for a political ride. The current and former sugar workers complain that this and the preceding Government neglected and marginalised the sugar community that resulted in its present condition. It is noted that some US$130 million from the EU meant for sugar workers was diverted into the national Budget which undermined the sugar industry. The coalition received over $5 billion from the EU. Why was it not infused into sugar? Had the People’s Progressive Party and the coalition Governments efficiently utilised the resources at its disposal meant for the sugar industry, it would have been operating at a profit. Since private cane farmers have been cultivating sugar at a profit, there is no reason why the State cannot grow sugar profitably.

The Security Minister and the Government should look at the real causes for the prison riot and jailbreak rather than casting blame on hard working innocent sugar workers.

Yours truly,

Vishnu Bisram