Guyana Defence Force (GDF) Chief of Staff, Brigadier General Edward Collins on Thursday said that preparations to court-martial officers who might have been involved in the disappearance of 30 AK-47 rifles from Camp Ayanganna are moving apace.
Collins said the army is waiting for the right time for procedures to start and investigations are still ongoing almost one year after the theft. Stabroek News (SN) was privy to information which indicated that following new leads on the theft a key decision from authorities, relating to a senior GDF official, was pending. The source said, too, that new intelligence information pointed in the direction of the official. SN also understands that as a result a decision may be made shortly to send the senior army official on leave pending a full investigation or a possible interdiction. In response to a query from the media, Collins reiterated that it was never regular procedure to have any officer taken off from duties pending a court martial.
This newspaper understands that the new leads included information on where three of the missing weapons were found and that this information would likely be addressed by officials at the level of the Defence Board and higher.
The source pointed out that there is a risk that handling the information within the ambit of the GDF probe could lead to it being compromised and this has spurred much speculation and uneasiness since it is unclear who else might have been involved in the plot to steal the weapons.
SN also learnt that the weeks-old revelations had forced the convening of a series of emergency meetings but investigations are still continuing. Investigations to date, the source said, have also revealed that information was supplied to investigators in such a way as to throw them off track.
Last month Secretary to the Defence Board, Dr. Roger Luncheon, publicly apologised to the nation for not being able to give an update on the status of the investigations. “We have been unable to come to the Guyanese people and say where we are in terms of the investigation into the disappearance of the weapons and the efforts in identifying those involved and recovery of the other weapons,” he said. Luncheon, who is also Head of the Presidential Secretariat, said he could not verify whether the army was preparing to court-martial any top-ranking officials, as had been published in a number of reports carried by this newspaper and in other sections of the media. In response to a query about why both the government and the army have been tight-lipped on the recent media reports on the issue, Luncheon said that such measures would have defence board implications but pointed out that the authorities were not in a position to proceed with a comprehensive report to the public. He said too that the inability to bring closure and identify those responsible and to recover the other weapons could be seen as an indictment of the way the army has been discharging its responsibilities.
The army acknowledged losing 30 AK-47s and five handguns from its headquarters in March last year but to date no one has been charged.
