Dear Editor,
In this country with a zero population growth with large land space, long open borders, surrounded by Brazil, Venezuela and Suriname, can we man our borders effectively?
The answer must be no. We do not have the numbers, the equipment and the arsenal. As far as the security of our borders is concerned, the GDF is therefore useless. We rely on international treaties. At all times we must have a knowledgeable and powerful foreign minister and we have so far always been fortunate to have had a foreign minister of stature.
Do we therefore need an army? Is our army on which we spend billions of taxpayers’ dollars worth keeping? Over the years, the GDF has proved to be of negative value. It was allegedly involved in ballot box fraud during the Burnham era. It proved useless against Venezuela and was implicated in the loss of AK-47s.
What the state needs is to minimize the GDF into a people’s militia and to utilise the money that is being spent on the GDF on an expansion of the police force with better training, better income, better physical facilities throughout Guyana, better communications, a strong maritime division – and so on.
The police are doing as much as they can do even with a basic take home pay of $30,000 per month. Imagine the morale the above would have on the police force. If members of the GDF want to join the GPF let them, after all they are partially trained.
Yours faithfully,
MY Bacchus
