Special Report on the Rodney Commission of Inquiry by Shaun Michael Samaroo

The plot thickens…
COI learns GDF loaned grenade launcher to Corbin

DARK political plots that devastated Guyana’s State institutions and stifled its social and economic development in the 1970s and 1980s led to the grotesque corrupting and compromising of the integrity of the Guyana Defence Force (GDF), with missing confidential files, missing high-powered military weapons and mysterious documents baffling the nation today.Evidence led at the Walter Rodney Commission of Inquiry going on at the High Court in Georgetown reveals an intriguing mystery of shadowy figures bent on violating norms, procedures and standard operating procedures at the Guyanese Army during the PNC (People’s National Congress)-led administration .
Lieutenant Colonel Sydney James yesterday told the Presidential Commission that he cannot explain how Officers’ personal files went missing from secured locations at Army headquarters, Camp Ayanganna, here in Georgetown; how high-powered GDF weapons are missing decades after they were loaned to a PNC Government Ministry; and why standard operating procedures contain glaring discrepancies.

‘Labelled in bold letters “SECRET”, the document refers to “recovery of weapons at Mahaicony East Coast Demerara on Wednesday 2008-01-09, property of the Guyana Defense Force (GDF)”. Colonel James’ report to Commodore Best listed a number of weapons that the GDF loaned to the PNC Government’s Ministry of National Development.

Lieutenant Colonel James resumed the witness stand yesterday morning, and spent the bulk of the day answering questions from Commission Counsel Glen Hanoman to establish that the GDF ’s operating procedures were comprised and corrupted during the period 1978 to 1980, with the State of the PNC Government transferring guns from GDF stores to the Ministry of National Development, over a period of several years.
The witness submitted a document to the Commission as evidence. The document shows that the witness wrote and issued a Secret Army document in 2008, addressed to then Chief-of-Staff, Commodore Gary Best.

‘In testimony, Colonel James said the GDF loaned grenade launcher guns to external agencies, including the notorious Ministry, and identified the M72 gun as a grenade launcher. And the three weapons that the Police seized from criminals in the deadly shootout at Mahaicony on Wednesday January 9, 2008, at about 13:30 hours, included an M72 gun. The two others were submachine guns, traced to missing guns that the GDF had loaned to the PNC Government’s Ministry of National Development, which were never returned to the Army. The GDF loaned the weapons to the Ministry on August 10, 1979. The GDF also loaned the Ministry guns on May 19, 1976’

Labelled in bold letters, “SECRET”, the document refers to “recovery of weapons at Mahaicony, East Coast Demerara on Wednesday 2008-01-09, property of the Guyana Defence Force (GDF)”. Colonel James’ report to Commodore Best listed a number of weapons that the GDF had loaned to the PNC Government’s Ministry of National Development.
In testimony, Colonel James said the GDF loaned grenade launcher guns to external agencies, including the notorious Ministry, and identified the M72 gun as a grenade launcher. And the three weapons that the Police seized from criminals in the deadly shootout at Mahaicony on Wednesday, January 9, 2008, at around 13:30 hours, included an M72 gun. The two other weapons were submachine guns, traced to missing guns that the GDF had loaned to the PNC Government’s Ministry of National Development, which were never returned to the Army. The GDF loaned the weapons to the Ministry on August 10, 1979. The GDF also loaned the Ministry guns on May 19, 1976.
Colonel James’ report said:

– “issued to the Minister R, Corbin on 1976-05-18, 07 x S&W 9 mm pistols.”
– “issued to the Minister R. Corbin, Ministry of National Development on 1976-05-19, 50xM10 pistols.”
– “issued to the Ministry of National Development on 1976-10-13, 06x.22 rifles, 06x.30 Carbines, 06x.303 rifles and 15 x SLR rifles.”

Colonel James’ report to Chief-of-Staff Best includes a number of other weapons issued to the Ministry and other organizations, including paramilitary organizations.
Colonel James’ report says that “what has been determined, based on the check of the records available, was that M72 gun serial # 27589, and Beretta 9mm Submachine gun serial # 21025 issued to the Ministry of National Development on 1976-08-19, were not returned.”
The Officer’s report had stated earlier that “on Wed 08-01-09, at approximately 1330 hours, three (3) weapons, a M72 Gun serial # 27589, Beretta Submachine Gun serial # 20125 and a Ducktown TN 9mm Submachine Gun serial # 940024066, were recovered by the Police, after a shootout with criminal elements in the Mahaicony Creek area.”
Those weapons that the Police recovered had the same serial numbers as the guns the GDF had loaned to the Ministry of National Development in 1976.
Colonel James issued his report to Commodore Best, the Deputy Chief of Staff, the Colonel General Staff and the Colonel Administration and Quartering at the GDF, while a copy was filed at Army headquarters.
In examining the witness yesterday, Counsel Hanoman noted that evidence at the Commission shows that the Ministry of National Development was destroyed by fire in July 1979, yet the GDF has vouchers showing that weapons were handed over to the Ministry in August 1979.
Hanoman also established from Colonel James’ testimony that the GDF never did search, and is not now searching for the weapons missing from its stores. Colonel James said there’s no search being conducted because no such instructions came from the Chief-of-Staff.
Colonel James also said that grenade launchers – the M72 guns – were issued to the Ministry of National Development just eight months before Dr. Walter Rodney was killed in an alleged political assassination, when a bomb exploded in the populist political leader’s car in Georgetown on the evening of June 13, 1980.
For the past 34 years, the world at large and the Party that Dr Rodney led, the Working People’s Alliance (WPA), have clamored for an independent inquiry into the assassination of Dr Rodney. The WPA claimed that GDF Sergeant Gregory Smith carried out the assassination, but the GDF cannot locate any personal files on the late Smith, who died a few years ago in French Guiana, where he lived in exile.
Colonel James said the personal files of two officers that he tried to locate — 4141 W Smith and 1731 Private Leon Molena– are missing. Colonel James said Smith’s personal file would have been tightly secured at GDF headquarters, with restricted access and under lock-and-key. He could not say why or how the files could have gone missing.
The Officer said the Army is continuing its investigations into the missing files.
Yesterday’s hearing ended with Counsel for the PNC, Basil Williams, cross-examining Colonel James.
In the few minutes Williams cross-examined the witness, Colonel James established that the vouchers of the missing GDF weapons are authentic records, and verifiable in other documentation.
The Commission is unearthing the social and economic conditions that stemmed from the PNC’s nefarious, conspiratorial political plots and ugly power paranoia that existed in the 1978 to 1980 period which led to the brutal bomb blast death of Guyana’s foremost historian and international scholar, Dr Rodney.
The Commission sits this morning, with PNC Counsel Williams set to cross-examine Colonel James.