Tackling and effectively addressing the country’s domestic security challenges, one of the issues at the very top of the local Private Sector Commission’s (PSC) agenda of concerns has become an essential prerequisite to taking Guyana’s economy forward, newly elected PSC Chairman, Major General Norman Mc Lean has told the Stabroek Business.
He said that while increasing remuneration in the Guyana Police Force (GPF) ought to be a matter of official priority, “more pay should not be seen as the solution to the problem of corrupt policemen.”
In an exclusive interview with this newspaper on Wednesday, McLean said that public/private sector efforts to take the country’s economy forward would require the strong support of the country’s law-enforcement agencies. He said efforts to build investor confidence in Guyana could not go forward in circumstances where there was the ever present danger of Guyanese returning home or visitors to the country for business or tourism purposes being robbed on their way into the city from the airport. “We cannot build confidence in Guyana when that sort of crime persists,” McLean said.
Critics of what is widely regarded as an inadequate police response to the local crime challenge have said that the underperformance of the force is due to, among other things, the poor remuneration afforded the GPF. “Of course better pay cannot be ignored as an issue. But setting aside what might be termed a fair salary there is also the question of integrity. A good police officer has to have a certain level of integrity. The truth is that we will probably not be able to pay a good police officer what he is worth,” he said.
In his recent acceptance speech following his election to the chairmanship of the PSC McLean had alluded to “the major problem of public safety and security; crime seems to be on the increase. Every day newspapers are headlined with shootings, robbery or murders – our image is a bad one. As soon as people arrive from the airport they are being robbed. This is the perception.” He declared, “Without security there can be no development.”
Over the years the GPF has come under increasing scrutiny with incidents of policemen being fingered in scams and as accomplices in crimes. McLean said he believed that the Force’s training regime could contribute more to shaping the outlook of law enforcement officers and focus their energies on fighting crime. “There was a time when things were different. Corruption was not an issue. There was a time when the training, including the barrack room culture, placed a high priority on camaraderie. Things are different now. We have policemen who live at home and turn up for work in civilian clothes.”
