Dear Editor
Please permit me to again make another clarion call for the injustice committed on members of the Guyana Police Force to be corrected. The last two police promotions saw very little in the way of consequential promotions although vacancies existed for such to be made. Officers including the very senior and cadets who by the next decade will be at the apex of management in the GPF, were generally bunched into one date of appointment. The long tried and tested traditional system of making appointments retroactive to the dates the vacancies exist were apparently thrown through the window. As a result hard-working and honest policemen were unjustly denied money legally due to them and will suffer other losses including superannuation benefits.
The Police Service Commission is presently interviewing police personnel in an effort to promote them in time for the force anniversary celebrations in July, 2016. Judging from what is coming out of the PSC, it leaves one with the impression that there will be little or no consequential promotions this time around. One very senior and influential member of the promotion apparatus was asked about consequential. He is reported to have said, “What the police want with consequential promotion. Them work for it?”
The Guyana Police Force is considered a disciplined organisation. The purpose of discipline is to promote desired behaviour, which may be done by rewarding ranks for acceptable behaviour and punishing them for inappropriate conduct. It is a case of reward and punishment. The punishment may include warnings, loss of earnings, transfers, interdictions from duty, charging and placing before the courts, reductions in rank, being denied promotions, loss of seniority and many more corrective actions. I have no issue with ranks being punished for unacceptable behaviour, but on the other hand deserving ranks must be rewarded for outstanding work done in keeping with the conditions of service. To deny the police officers consequential promotions will certainly not motivate them to deliver the highest quality of service to the police, the communities they serve and the country as a whole.
The time is not too late for the Guyana Police Force, the Police Service Commission, the Ministry of Public Security, the Ministry of State and all other stakeholders to be involved individually and/or collectively to ensure that those outstanding policemen who were unjustly denied consequential promotions over the last few years be given their due reward and that we will see this at the upcoming promotions. Hammer the police whenever they transgress, but please give them their just reward when due, however infinitesimal it may be.
Yours faithfully,
Clinton Conway
Assistant Commissioner of Police
(rtd)