Dear Editor,
The new protest twins seem to be bound together in all ways. When I had already started a letter about the assaults on Mr Freddie Kissoon, the news of Mr Mark Benschop’s positive action against the garbage truck with a cargo of new garbage for the citizens appeared and I felt called upon to commend his act. Since then the two were arrested and locked up and are now before the court.
There is an offence called contempt of court, but the law enforcement officers and their overseers sometimes bring charges which demonstrate that they do not take the courts seriously. Is that not another form of contempt? In some cases one or other party may request the court to visit the scene of the crime. In the pubic interest I recommend this course of action to the prosecution in this garbage case. I had planned to question whether, following one of his recent reports, Mr Kissoon appears to be receiving the ‘protection of the law’ to which the constitution entitles every person in Guyana. The well-known columnist had been previously assaulted with faecal garbage on the public street, had reported the assault to the police and has not received ‘the protection of the law.’ No one has been charged with that offensive street assault. In a strange kind of witness protection, employees of a government enterprise cannot even be questioned by the police. The allegation made by the offender about Mr Kissoon’s alleged conduct has been dropped. But the incident sent an unfortunate message to all friends of the government that certain people who attack the government do not enjoy ‘the protection of the law.’ I am not demanding a conviction of alleged aggressors without an examination of the evidence by a proper tribunal. I am demanding active investigation by the police when citizens complain. I recall a case in which a police station had prepared a charge of indecent assault by an employer and had to send the file to the DPP on request; thereafter the investigation ended. As Rosa Luxemburg told her Marxist colleagues ages ago, rights for only friends of the government could not be acceptable.
There was that Minister nearly two years ago who had plainly, with or without provocation, committed a breach of the peace.
The President is perhaps protected from being charged by the police with a crime. Columnist Kissoon reminded me that he had allegedly boasted of this to the woman he pretended to marry. The Pandit who married them is not protected by the constitution. He had a statutory duty to register the marriage. If he had been charged he would have had to make a defence to the court. He might then have said that the President did not sign the required papers. It is the woman, coming home not to pose, but to marry, who did not have ‘the protection of the law.’
Protection of the law appears to be available to PPP supporters, but this is not true except for the elite. Look at the Lusignan killing of the eleven innocents when the menace was well known and a series of patrols and other measures available to the government should have discouraged such an event. The President claimed to have videos, which are still secret. Those security forces who tortured the two young men of Buxton, names known, do not enjoy immunity under the constitution. Only US personnel do under a special act. The UN Code for Law Enforcement Officers declares that it should not be a defence for police to plead “higher orders.” Those in our Republic who are tortured do not enjoy the protection of the law or the support of the President, who owes them support under his oath of office. So he visits a valid part of his domain, Buxton, for the second time, exercising his rights and his power, and for the second time talks about giving them a sum of millions of public funds, and says nothing about the torture victims who come from the poor of the community. When on April 7, 2001 a woman was shot outside Freedom House, there was no investigation. The authorities took note. They paid. They did not offer protection of the law. The same night a man was found dead elsewhere in the city. No suspect surfaced in either case. His fate in terms of compensation to his family was not made known.
There was also the killing by police fire at Buxton of a poor woman on her way home from work. Was there an inquest? Was there any recompense? How did her case compare with that of the woman vendor killed near Freedom House on the night of the April 7, 2001 fires? Whose firearm had caused the Robb Street death? What circumstances gave rise to the payment? Was the money for funeral expenses? I leave names out because the cases are well known in Guyana.
In this pre-election period, unless the population presses its rights, the new government will. Perhaps this is what Dr Hinds meant when he recommended agitation as a process, and spoke of dignity. In the British Guiana legislative Council, Dr Jagan had exclaimed, “Justice is bought and sold!” He knew what he was saying. His second visit to Buxton confirmed that President Jagdeo does not easily wear others’ shoes. I have been patient, being distant. I am also old and do not apologise for that chance. It could be that on the first visit last August President Jagdeo’s insensitivity was due to absent-mindedness, or bad advice. On the second visit the arrogance of power stood out. He could not for a second time forget the wounds of the non-offenders of the village.
Although the government had failed to protect persons and communities deserving protection, the public has a responsibility. It is to not stand idly by, duck and hide. It would have been so empowering if someone in that Buxton crowd had asked with respect, decency and spirit, “What about the young men? Will the government respect them, like the old society hall?”
These things can be left to time, but as in the bandit ‘Blackie’ London’s case, ‘Time plants the seeds of anger.’
Yours faithfully,
Eusi Kwayana
