PPP General Secretary Bharrat Jagdeo on Thursday said that remarks he made about taking secrets to the grave had nothing to do with information on killings during the 2002-9 crime wave but related to the need to protect the identities of persons who provided important information.
At a press conference at Freedom House, Jagdeo was responding to a letter from the family of PPP/C Minister Satyadeow `Sash’ Sawh who was gunned down along with relatives and an employee in 2006.
Sawh’s son, Roger had penned a letter in Thursday’s edition of Stabroek News expressing concern that Jagdeo’s “go to the grave” remarks at a night of reflection for the late Dr Roger Luncheon pertained to material information about the deaths from that period.
Questioned by Stabroek News about Sawh’s letter, Jagdeo said his ‘go to the grave’ statement was connected to persons whose lives would be at risk now if their identities and roles played during the crime wave becomes public knowledge.
Sawh had argued that Jagdeo’s remark disregarded a fundamental expectation of law, order and justice.
Jagdeo, who was President during the 2002-2009 period in what many termed the ‘crime wave’”, said that it was the persons in communities such as Buxton, on the East Coast of Demerara, and soldiers in the Guyana Defence Force who had helped to expose a seeming cover-up where “sterilized documents” were given to his government but which did not reflect what was really happening on the ground.
“They believe we were duped …and I spoke about this at Roger’s funeral, where all of the reports were sterilized. We had people in the community of Buxton who were totally dissatisfied with what was happening in their community. Many of those people are still alive. Many of them still live in those communities. Many of the soldiers that helped to expose the sterilized versions of the documents… they are still there,” Jagdeo said.
“Those people need to be protected; they still need to be protected. They put their lives at risk to give us information that ultimately led to either the arrest of these people or in engagements with the security forces, they were killed. A lot of those people are still in the system, people who placed themselves at personal risk. It had nothing to do with that [the ‘Sash’ Sawh killing]. There was information on Sash Sawh. That matter, as you would recall, the police closed the files, they charged two persons….,” he added. Jagdeo pointed out that he made the comments in defence of Luncheon because the opposition APNU had put out a statement following Luncheon’s passing that he believes sought to disparage Luncheon. “For APNU to come at this stage, when Roger had passed away and in a statement blamed him for what took place at Buxton…the statement they issued after his passing, that is why it warranted saying something…,” he said.
The family of Sawh has waged a 17-year campaign for answers on his murder and those of his brother, sister and a security guard on the night of April 22, 2006. The gruesome murders occurred under the Jagdeo presidency and amid a runaway crime spree. No one was ever tried for the murders, though the authorities at the time had said that the prime suspects had died during confrontations with the security forces. Jagdeo said that the Sawh family suffered immense trauma and that Sawh’s killing was a loss for the PPP/C too, but in no way were his remarks linked to those murders.
“It has nothing to do with `Sash’ Sawh and the `Sash’ Sawh years,” he said, while noting that the family was privy to the police files on the case. “What I said there had nothing to do with that matter, because that issue was we had people who were charged. We were convinced, based on the police investigations,” he said.
First-hand
On the night of reflection for Dr. Luncheon, Jagdeo, referring to the crime wave period, said that Luncheon knew first-hand the difficulties and trauma the country faced.
“The Chief of Staff said, tonight, about his close relationship with the GDF. Gail Teixeira mentioned the crime period; the difficult period. I will want to explore how, in that difficult period, when the leadership of the army did not support the fight against the criminals who were massacring people, how we had to navigate that difficult period. And Roger Luncheon was at the centre of it; to keep the people of this country safe when the people who were vested by our Constitution and laws to protect them, did not do their job. Today, I see many of them in the public domain. They still have a lot to say but they have a very sordid history of neglect of responsibility,” he had said.
“So there are a lot of things we wish to explore that may be uncomfortable truths. We need to explore. People talk about a different era. The era, yes it was, we did not have money, so we had to solve a lot of tasks by being creative. The changes that we have today, the Chief of staff is here. If you look at the budget of the army in 1990; the Capital Budget. It was $2M Guyana dollars – less than the salary of one individual, the annual salary, of one individual, in the foreign ministry. One person in the foreign ministry was earning more per year than the entire capital budget of the army. If you don’t believe me, go to the estimates and you will see that figure there, and I will name the individual who was earning that salary,” he added.
Jagdeo spoke about the PPP/C and the many adaptations it has had to make with the changing times both globally and locally while staying true to its principles. “Tonight I want to talk about the party. We had to make changes over the years. A party remains relevant if it changes constantly and refreshes itself. Roger has had a serious role in ensuring the party kept to its core principles,” he said while noting that those principles are pillared in respect for people, remaining multi-ethic, open and always forming policy to benefit the working class or grassroots.
“I can’t speak of everything. Some things will go to the grave with us. Luncheon took them to the grave,” he said. Regarding Luncheon’s history in Guyana’s politics and issues faced in the country, he said there are things there that will also be buried with Luncheon and himself.
“There are lots of things in the history of this country and how we navigated through very contentious periods that we’ll all have to take to the grave. But Roger Luncheon has been central to everything, everything that has happened thus far under almost all PPP governments, and he has been a very important person for the party. I am sure he will be missed by everyone…,” Jagdeo said.
With the security forces unable to control the security situation several death squads arose. Luncheon, who was Cabinet Secretary and Head of the Presidential Secretariat at the time, famously anointed them as a “phantom force”.
In relation to those in the army who had not discharged their obligations, Jagdeo said: “They are all out now. Their whole leadership. Almost the top four or five had to make way for a new Chief of Staff when I was President and they had no role again in the command structure and that was when we started making progress”.
Jagdeo, who was also Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces at the time did not state what he or any of the PPP/C governments did to discipline or prosecute those who had presented the “sterilized documents’.
