THE People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) has declared that they welcome the establishment of a Commission of Inquiry (CoI) which would probe a large number of killings between 2000 and 2008, during the tenure of former President Bharrat Jagdeo.Making this disclosure yesterday to members of the media, PPP/C’s General Secretary, Clement Rohee highlighted that, “the PPP/C welcomes the establishment of a CoI into the said events

providing that its terms of reference is broad enough to take into account the involvement of the PNC, and how its operatives supported the criminal enterprise resulting in the people and village of Buxton being held under siege by the criminals.”
The party, he stated, shares a keen and equal interest in what took place during that era and will remain supportive of any investigations into the killing of members of the Guyana Police Force (GPF) and particularly the assassination of former Agriculture Minister Satyadeow Sawh.
Rohee observed that the GPF has in their possession statements about who killed these persons, and that several members of the GPF and Guyana Defence Force (GDF) were directly and actively involved in the operations, and persons who led investigations during that period are currently serving in the current Administration.
Apart from that, the PPP/C is of the view that the CoI must seek to reintroduce the tape recording which included the now Minister of Citizenship, Winston Felix and the Attorney General, Basil Williams, conversing with each other and discussing the diversion of tension from the People’s National Congress (PNC) with respect to its involvement in the Agricola, East Bank Demerara massacre and the planting of drugs on a passenger at the Cheddi Jagan International Airport (CJIA).
Meanwhile, President David Granger told a gathering on Sunday at the Cuffy250 Third Annual State of the African-Guyanese Forum at the Critchlow Labour College that during the period 2000 and 2008, Guyana was hit with one of the most murderous so-called crime sprees in its history, with the reign of drug lords and hitmen, corrupt police, phantom squads and other death squads who almost brought the country to a state of anarchy.
The period saw the deadly Mash Day 2002 Camp Street jail break, gunning down of unarmed youths, execution-style killings of policemen, murders of businessmen, disappearances of individuals, kidnappings, high profile robberies, hijackings and shootouts between criminals and Joint Services ranks.
Subsequent tales by an informant at the time placed Government officials at the centre of some of the underworld activities, but that informant, George Bacchus, was subsequently gunned down.
The killings have left many widows, orphans and other individuals with emotional scars.

President Granger also said on Sunday that, “When you have young men being shot in the back of their heads with their hands tied, when you have so many deaths which have not been investigated, when a Minister of the Government has been assassinated and you don’t even have an inquest into his death, it is something stink, something stink and we are going to investigate those deaths.”

Navendra Seoraj