Eighteen police ranks have been ordered to pay for the cost of damage to Guyana Police Force’s (GPF) vehicles which have amounted to approximately $2.4 million in the last six months, Acting Commissioner David Ramnarine disclosed yesterday.
The disclosure was made at a GPF award ceremony which is part of their 179th anniversary celebrations.
According to Ramnarine, the traffic situation, which remains of paramount concern for the force around the country, has not only been worsened by the “careless, dangerous and reckless behaviour of civilian drivers and other roads users, but by some of our very own who should know better having received higher learning and training as law enforcement officials.”
“Yet still over the years, speeding, drunk driving and inattentiveness plague us as the primary factors to fatal accidents,” he said.
According to Ramnarine, for the period of June 2016 to July 2017, 18 members of the police were involved in various accidents while driving GPF vehicles, while another 23 were involved in accidents between the period of July 2017 and June 2018, bringing the total figure to 41.
David Ramnarine
Out of the 41 ranks, 34 of them were police constables and a further 18 were involved in accidents with their private vehicles.
“I need to let you know that on 18 occasions this year, in six months, where members of the force driving force vehicles were involved in accidents, where they were responsible for causing that accident (they) have been made to repay or to pay for the cost of the damage that amount to some $2,394, 000,” Ramnarine said.
He noted that so far ten of the ranks have settled their payments, while the remainder have been given time to repay the outstanding debts for the damage.
“These occurrences cannot be ones that we can be satisfied with. We have taken an oath, we wear a uniform, we have higher training and learning and therefore we must conduct ourselves a lot better than we do. That is the position we have to enforce. We have long since preached against speeding and reckless driving and we only permitted that in emergency situations and in situations where, for example, you are fired upon and there is greater danger to public safety if you don’t take a certain course of action,” Ramnarine said.
He stressed that there have been several occasions where ranks have chased behind cyclists that would’ve committed minor traffic infractions and even though they were unable to apprehend the culprit, they would’ve ended up “slamming into a civilian vehicle and damaging the police vehicle beyond repair.”
Against this backdrop Ramnarine implored the ranks to use their judgement, “or as I indicated, you will have to pay, this is the position.”
He said that it is “grossly reprehensible and disrespectful” that members of the force are equally guilty of breaching traffic regulations and that there have been a number of instances where we dismissed members of the force that were charged with “very serious traffic offences and who did not have a driver’s licence, no insurance and others.”
“How can you tolerate that? This is the force’s anniversary [and] we cannot move forward in the same vein. There’s an old saying; if you continue to do the same thing over and over again in the same way and expect different results, well it’s the height of lunacy, meaning madness,” he added, while encouraging the ranks to make significant and positive improvements, and to set the example by good private and public conduct with regards to using the road and adhering to the rules and regulations.
He also noted that the members of the force need to quickly and constantly appreciate the rules of the road and that once they enter a vehicle and start to drive then they need to enforce the five Cs rule -care, caution, consideration, courtesy, common sense – as they are equally applicable to members of the public, as well as members of the force.
“…And we have to appreciate and understand that the TIN regulations and other laws that require licences and insurance are not to be blatantly flouted,” he said.
