Dear Editor,
It is public knowledge that the police, in conjunction with the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions, have established that the state has no credible evidence with which to charge and prosecute Mr Roger Khan. This was further acknowledged by Guyana’s Head of State, Mr David Granger, and also by the PNCR.
Therefore, any call, inference, or suggestion for the state (i.e., “state agencies”) to produce information to prosecute Mr Roger Khan, as has emerged from Mr Granger and the PNCR, is a likely recipe to manufacture evidence and undermine any prospect of a fair hearing should there be one.
Prosecution of Mr Roger Khan is high on the PNCR agenda, especially since the party failed to prevent his return to Guyana on the eve of elections. However, any sudden production of evidence to prosecute Mr Khan upon his immediate return, after the passage of 13 years of failed investigations, will point to political interference.
Mr Roger Khan should not be used by politicians as cannon fodder to gin up election votes.
The PNCR have already adjudged Mr Khan to be guilty. For example, on October 18, 2019, PNCR executive and former GDF Chief-of-Staff Gary Best spoke about “the issue of crimes perpetuated by Mr Roger Khan” without any mention of the word “alleged” to identify that all that exists are allegations.
But this is the arrogance Guyana is subject to on account of political actors who operate above the rule of law; they do and say whatever they want. It is this identical arrogance that gave rise to the political violence that surfaced during 2001 to 2006 by people who felt they could topple a regime elected by the electorate.
Mr Best, for example, to rebuff criticism against the PNCR, said that the PNCR did not gather evidence against Mr Khan during these years because the party “did not have the government apparatus to do investigations.”
This may sound like a reasonable response but this is not exactly what the PNCR projected in the past. In June 2006, for example, the PNCR gave the impression that it had the capacity to and indeed conducted criminal investigations, despite being a political party.
Some of the reporters covering PNCR press conferences may be too young and inexperienced to cover the 2001-2006 time period in Guyana’s history. On or about June 3, 2006, the joint services issued a press release alleging that persons with ties to the drug trade were attempting to raise a private army by recruiting former members of the army and police.
It was meant to sway public opinion against Mr Roger Khan as certain senior officials in the joint services used “government apparatus” as Mr Best would have it, to expel Mr Khan from his native domicile, without any due process, treaty, or legal procedure including comity between nations.
The PNCR, in its frenzied obsession with Mr Roger Khan, issued its own press statement on or about June 8, 2006: “The PNCR has also confirmed the joint services statement that criminal enterprise is actively recruiting ex-military persons in order to promote further terror and create instability…”
Here is where Mr Best becomes trapped by the elaborate web of misrepresentation spawned by Congress Place, which has also bamboozled PNCR supporters for over a decade.
How could a political party confirm/verify the findings of state police? This is highly unusual and would require the PNCR itself to conduct investigations. How could the PNCR confirm investigations if the party lacked “government apparatus” to investigate?
One answer is that there were no investigations and the PNCR received (outside of the ambit of the law), sensitive intelligence from the joint services. The then head of the police and the then head of the army (the then president aside), are now primary members of the PNCR, and this is no coincidence.
This explains why on or about June 14th and 15th of 2006, letters appeared in two Guyanese newspapers (Chronicle and Kaieteur News) from this writer accusing the PNCR and the joint services of collusion. To date, there was no response to those letters.
The public should ensure that the past does not repeat itself here because this is precisely what the PNCR is attempting to get done.
Yours faithfully,
Rakesh Rampertab
