The eminent commissioners thus concluded: “There was no concrete evidence before us to substantiate that view.” Instead, the commissioners laid blame for the unfortunate incidents that transpired at the Wismar/Mackenzie Bridge squarely at the feet of the organisers of the planned, five-day protest action.
Led by Former Jamaican Chief Justice Mr Lensley Wolfe, the commissioners in fact chided A Partnership for National Unity’s (APNU’s) Member of Parliament Desmond Trotman, who had held the view that the police should not have intervened to quell the unlawful actions taking place.
That attempt by the police to clear the Wismar/Mackenzie Bridge was met with a hostile crowd, and resulted in the fatal shootings; but according to the commissioners’ findings, it was the breaching of the conditions that accompanied the permission granted to the organisers of the march that served as the catalyst for the mayhem.
The commissioners concluded that the breaching of the conditions accepted by the organisers “was the birth of the ensuing problems.”
The commissioners found that permission was granted to the organisers of the march, but “with conditions attached to ensure that the rights of the citizens were balanced.”
In reference to the protection of freedoms and a right to demonstrate peacefully, as guaranteed by the Guyana Constitution, its framers enshrined that this is not an absolute right, according to the commissioners.
The report said that APNU’s Parliamentarian Desmond Trotman, who was at the scene at the time, “stubbornly refused to accept that the protesters had resorted to unlawful means to carry out what would otherwise have been a lawful endeavour.”
The report documents that “to him, the police ought not to have intervened, because the protest was for a just cause.”
The commissioners said in response to Trotman’s action and posture that “the justice of a cause seldom, if ever, justifies a breach of the Constitution; and certainly, in this situation, we are of the view that, whilst we empathise with the citizens, resorting to unlawful means could not have been condoned by the police.”
In deciphering the evidence that had been presented to the Commission of Inquiry during the weeks of gruelling testimony, the commissioners found that, “from all accounts, the acts of violence and destruction that immediately followed the shootings on July 18th were committed by unidentified protestors.”
The Linmine Secretariat was torched, and burned for several hours as ranks of the Guyana Fire Service were prevented access to the scene. The commissioners conclude that, based on the evidence presented, it is apparent that the burning of the state-owned Linmine Secretariat building and the attempt to burn down the Peoples Progresssive Party building which occurred after 7.00 pm “suggests that this was in reaction to the shootings which would have occurred just prior to these actions.
“The evidence of the fire officials, that when they attempted to proceed to the address of the Secretariat they came under attack from protestors who threw stones, bottles and other missiles at them in the vicinity of Five Corner and Washer Pond Road, supports the contention that it was the protestors who engaged in violence immediately after the shootings of July 18th.”, the commissioners concluded.
