– renegotiation necessary, Luncheon says
The UK’s proposals for implementing the security sector reform plan disregarded an agreement for local ownership of the process, according to Dr Roger Luncheon, who yesterday said the government is not prepared to cede an inch of its sovereignty.
At his post-Cabinet press briefing at the Office of the President, the Head of the Presidential Secretariat blamed the departure from an agreement reached in December last year as the reason why there has been no forward movement on implementation of the £3 million joint project for reforming Guyana’s security sector. “The British proposals abandon agreements we had on specifically ‘Guyana ownership,’” he said, telling reporters that he was presented with “what the Almighty said,” which totally disregarded all the notions of country’s sovereignty.
“We are not going to relent one inch, even a percentage of an inch, on that matter,” Luncheon emphasised, while dismissing the idea that the country lacks the capacity to implement the project. “…I can’t believe that [or] that the technical aspects of security sector reform [are] so beyond us that indeed we have to be led and we have to be shown the way comprehensively from top to bottom; that we are just a passenger in this activity….,” he stated.
An interim Memorandum of Understanding for the four-year £3 million (nearly $1 billion) Security Sector Reform Action Plan was signed between Guyana and the UK in August 2007.
On Wednesday afternoon, the British High Commission reaffirmed its commitment to “Guyana’s national ownership” of the Security Sector Reform programme and to “build the capacity of national institutions to implement it. We remain open and ready to discuss any issue in relation to the programme,” it said in a brief statement.
Two days earlier, British High Commissioner Fraser Wheeler had revealed his frustration with the delay in implementation of the reform plan, saying some persons in government were quibbling about administrative details. He did not go into the details of the delay but emphasised that the UK sees the need for “very tight management of resources” in the current economic climate. “The administration of money should not be a deal breaker, I would hope, [the reform is] too important for that,” Wheeler said.
In response, the government released letters written by Luncheon to President Bharrat Jagdeo and Wheeler, in which he accused the UK’s representatives here of pursuing “ulterior motives,” while taking offence at an alleged suggestion that Guyana is incapable of managing the reform process. Luncheon has recommended that the proposals be rejected in their entirety and also requested that Jagdeo relieve him of responsibility for concluding the negotiations for the project. While the President commiserated with his feelings, Luncheon said, he did not grant his request to be relieved of responsibility for leading the negotiations.
Hallowed principle
The Guyana government has on several occasions sought to have meetings with the High Commission on the issue, Luncheon said yesterday, but attempts have been unsuccessful and there is yet to be agreement on when talks would take place. However, he maintained that the December 2008 agreement remains a starting point for any future discussions. “I do believe when we do meet, because I know we will meet, that this is where we should start from, all over again of course, but, at least we will start from a position that we both embrace,” he said.
Luncheon emphasised that during the negotiations both sides recognised the principle of Guyanese ownership of security policy formulation. “We weren’t asking for an arm and a leg,” he said, explaining that national ownership of the process was the bedrock underpinning the agreement. He noted that it is a hallowed principle in international relations and questioned where in the world it would be disregarded other than in a subordinate country or one that was totally destroyed. “We are not at that level,” he said.
Dignity
According to him, however, the proposals on implementation submitted in April failed to faithfully capture the respect for the principle agreed to by both sides–a point which he said was supported by all of the members of the Security Sector Reform Secretariat. Further, he added that there was no explanation for what led to the reversal. “This business about ‘Guyana ownership’ is inviolate as far as I am concerned. And if this sum of money, this support that is being offered, is seen as sufficient to undermine, is seen as appropriate, or even adequate, for us not to hallow this principle, that might be someone else’s consideration, it is not ours,” he explained. “Security sector reform will go on with or without the Brits. Its implementation would indeed be facilitated by their involvement but I am not going to give up the dignity of our sovereignty for the contributions that would come from an engagement on both sides, I’m sorry. That is not what is coming out from the discussion on the Guyanese side.”
He added that given the time that has already been invested in the process and the commitments made, it is in the interest of both countries to pursue the project together. “But we are not going to be led in this process, we wouldn’t accept that,” he declared.
Luncheon also said he did not anticipate the situation affecting relations between Guyana and Britain. He said the negotiations had broken down several times in the past but in those instances had not attracted media attention. He also underscored the point that discussions on national security with external partners are always fraught with difficulty, owing to sensitivities. He added that the government has shown its commitment to the process, which has seen among other things the creation of a Parliamentary Oversight Committee for the Security Sector and a Security Sector Reform Secretariat established within the Office of the President.
A joke
Meanwhile, AFC leader Raphael Trotman in a statement yesterday said his party is “extremely disturbed” by the report of the government’s unwillingness to proceed with joint implementation of the plan. It is reflective of a pattern by the Jagdeo administration of refusal to participate and implement whenever the need for comprehensive reform is identified within institutions that touch on governance, he said, accusing the government of frustrating the process to achieve its objective of ensuring minimal or no governance reforms. In this vein, he cited failure to implement the recommendations of the National Security Strategy Organising Committee of 2000, the Border/National Security Committee of 2001, the Disciplined Forces Commission of 2003, and of the National Drug Strategy Master Plan 2005-2009.
Tracing the genesis of the security sector reform plan, Trotman explained that it was seen as a critical component for the attainment of good and democratic governance and was twinned with the Commonwealth Secretariat’s sponsorship of the 2005 needs assessment of the National Assembly conducted by Sir Michael Davies and the resulting reform recommendations. The link between governance and security was recognised, assessed, and addressed through the recommendations made, he said, and further questioned whether the administration’s sincerity in agreeing and supporting the recommendations–which led to the mobilisation of funds, the input of experts as well as parliamentary activity–was meant to be a joke.
Recalling the National Stakeholder Consultations held in the aftermath of the Lusignan and Bartica massacres, Trotman noted that the President had extolled the virtues of the action plan as being the panacea of the ills within the sector. “Today we witness the government’s chief pretender and obstructionist, Dr Luncheon, saying that the plan will not be implemented because of ‘ulterior motives’ on the part of the British government,” he said. “The AFC had long suspected that the Jagdeo administration was not interested in genuine, comprehensive and transparent reform of the sector that has been for too long characterized by failure and ineptitude.”
Business as usual
Trotman also reiterated that there is deliberate disconnect between the Office of the President and the parliamentary oversight mechanisms put in place to oversee implementation and policy development of and within the security sector. Instead, he said, there has been a continuous pattern of obfuscation, frustration, and circumlocution, which he said indicate a deep reluctance on the part of the administration to implement reform measures and are coupled with its total lack of knowledge of the national security perils and their consequences. The AFC is convinced that the government uses engagements with national and international stakeholders and friends as pressure valves to be opened and utilised when there are crises, then goes back to business as usual when they subside, Trotman said.
The security sector reform programme was specifically designed to go beyond the operational aspects of reform by examining root causes, and the socio-political aspects of the security dilemmas we face, he explained. To this end, many national stakeholders, other than the government, were expected to play their part, he said, including Members of Parliament, and civil society. “The Government of Guyana was intended only to be the vehicle through which the reform process would be facilitated, but this desired outcome has not materialized,” he, however, noted, while reminding the administration that there is far more at stake nationally other than the protection of petty, partisan, and puerile interests. The PPP and the Jagdeo administration have refused to practice inclusive and participatory governance and are taking Guyana down a dark and dangerous road of repression, on which fear and the use of brute force, and torture will be used to govern and subjugate us Guyanese, Trotman said, but added that those who want inclusive and democratic governance will continue the fight for justice and our security.
