Prime Minister Moses Nagamootoo yesterday praised the Guyana Police Force for keeping the crime rate down.
He was at the time delivering the feature address during the opening ceremony of the Police Officers’ Annual Conference, where he boasted of the government’s ability to keep the country clear of the type of crime sprees which occurred under the previous administration.
“Since the assumption to office of our government, we can proudly proclaim that Guyana has no death squads, no extra-judicial killings, and no electronic support architecture for thecriminal enterprise and no agreement with the narco-syndicate to be an auxiliary of the national security apparatus,” he said.
He pointed out that fatal shootings by the police fell from 17 cases in 2008 and 13 in 2013, to only three such cases last year.
“…You have distanced yourself from contamination of past lawlessness and excesses in less than two years must be justification to say, ‘Well done.’ You could do better. And better you did,” he said to the ranks gathered at the Police Officers’ Mess Annexe.
He praised the force for lessening incidents of crime and placing captured suspects on trial.
“You have sent a strong message that you would deal condignly with law-breakers and that our system of justice ensures that those who do the crime, they would do the time! No statistics are more compelling than those for 2016 when there was a 63% detection rate for murder. Of the 142 reports, 89 cases were made out. I understand in police lingua, this is called the clear-up rate, and 63% represents the highest such clear-up rate for murder in fifteen years,” he said.
“Our government also notes with satisfaction that last year the Major Crimes Unit busted 37 cases… which include 10 “cold cases,” 11 murders and 11 robberies in which firearms had been used,’ he said.
According to Nagamootoo another highlight of the force’s work is the suppression of piracy, with only one such case reported in 2016.
He assured that his government is doing all it can to ensure that ranks are outfitted with the necessary resources to ensure that they continue to effectively tackle crime and protect citizens.
Nagamootoo, performing the functions of President, called on officers to continue leading by example. “I want to invite the young ranks in the police force to set your sight on every possibility for training and educational advancement, and to see your job as a knowledge-driven vocation that has mobility and a place at the top for every enterprising and ambitious recruit,” he also said.
The conference is being held under the theme ‘Forging ahead with professional and intelligence-led policing in collaboration with stakeholders.’
Police Commissioner Seelall Persaud, in his opening remarks, said that the force has achieved quite in lot in 2016.
He said that during those 12 months, the main focus was on capacity building, with the objective of improving the quality of service delivered to the public.
He said that the force has recruited, trained and deployed 893 new ranks, and created a number of new units within the Criminal Investigation Department, including the gender-based violence investigations units now in each division, an anti-narcotics unit in each division, a serial crimes unit and a forensic video analysis unit at the CID Headquarters.
He said too that it has ensured training in all aspects of force operations with assistance from overseas counterparts. He noted that 186 ranks attended overseas training in 2016 and another 405 benefited from training conducted locally.
He added that 273 ranks benefited from in-service training conducted by the force.
Persaud highlighted the training done by the Justice Education Society of Canada with ranks of the Major Crimes Unit, with general investigators, crime scene technicians and the forensic video analysts.
He said that the Special Organised Crime Unit, with its limited number of investigators, managed to complete 30 investigations in 2016, most of which were very complex. He said that some had resulted in criminal charges, while the other cases are awaiting legal advance.
The social crime prevention programme was expanded and maintained in 2016 and many community projects were successfully executed, he also said.
A total of 175 officers will be participating in the conference. Among the topics to be discussed are gender-based violence, security intelligence and traffic.
