Dear Editor,
The public support extended by the Guyana Private Sector Commission (PSC) to the professional leadership cadre and sleuths, subsequent to the arrests of the main suspects in the October 26 deadly bombing of the Mobil gas station, must be considered an appropriate decision and not mere rhetoric.
Recall that the PSC also informed and consulted the regional business community of its endorsement of the Argyle Agreement. Hopefully, other local NGOs, such as the GHRA (Mr McCormack), Help & Shelter, Red Thread, Child Link, as well as gender advocates concerned with the security/safety of female workers and SASOD, among others, will also take a similar public stance. National security doctrines, as these relate to the devastating activities of armed gangs, tend to converge.
The fact that the “Syndicato” or “R Syndicato” operates within the Hispanic arc is an important factor. Hopefully, as the operational aspect of local anti-terrorism personnel evolves into legal jurisprudence, there will be full cooperation at the diplomatic and interstate level with Venezuela’s envoy based in Georgetown, Carlos Amador Perez Silva, at least in ensuring that Daniel Peodomo and others are subject to legal prosecution and court hearing(s) based on this country’s laws.
Recall most recently, Silva cited embassy and statutory procedure while denying critical facts to which previously his position was the reverse. A number of Hispanic countries utilise their diplomatic privileges to shield or enable fugitives to evade another country’s constitutional rights.
It was none other than Jamaica’s Prime Minister, Andrew Holness, who last September reminded the international community, while addressing the United Nations General Assembly, of the serious dangers posed to Caribbean countries by armed gangs linked to international cartels. Guyana has had its own experience with these groups, commencing from the X-13 of the 1960s and subsequently from the 2002 jailbreak up until 2008. To the apolitical sectors in civil society, there may well be a relative complacency specific to this recent issue.
After all, the Syndicato Venezuelans have been known for quite some time to be active in the Cuyuni and elsewhere along the border geography, not in the heart of Georgetown. The problem here is that gangs involved in armed attacks on peaceful citizens invariably select vulnerable targets, especially in cases such as Jamaica, with its “enclaves” political violence history (the Dudas Coke gang and the spates of murders), or Haiti, where armed gangs practically control strategic locations in Port-au-Prince and possess American weaponry that surpasses that provided to that country’s national Police.
Another and related level of concern for Guyana is the fact that one of the country’s major political parties has had a leadership posture that includes exhortations such as “slo fiah” and “mo fiah” directed against a section of the business community that is of East Indian or Asian origin. The process that features the mission of the Customs Anti-Narcotics Unit (CANU) couples both state and non-state actors. As the unit’s director, James Singh, recently observed, the definition, the description, and the categorisation of narcotics is not a static “one size fits all” matter. (DPI bulletin CANU-Guyana & Early Warning System Against Drugs; October 10/11) To recap on the October 19 gas station attack, it must be absolutely clear that the “Syndicato” or “R Syndicato” will adopt its mode d’emploi in such a way as to counteract and ultimately degrade/destroy Guyana’s assets. These will include fixed capital as well as major transit points, including, at some stage, riverine launches and/or ferry vessels.
The loss of human lives seen in this perspective is regarded as collateral, or part of the operational risk involved in the subjugation of Guyana’s oil and mineral assets. Is there an inkling of a repetition regarding the attempted (and botched) gas station attacks during the years of “domestic terrorism”, 2002-2008? Recall the plan to incinerate or set fire to the then Shell gas/diesel station on Camp/New Market streets, as well as a similar attempt made to firebomb the “Two Brothers” gas outlet located at the edge of the East Bank Demerara approach to the city. Perhaps these are coincidences that would be disregarded by those who opt for the attitude of “let’s move on…” and, at times of peril, blame the point Minister (Education/Home Affairs…) or even demand the resignation of a popularly elected Government doing its utmost to devise a people-centred national security system.