Dear Editor,
DURING the last sitting of the National Assembly, before the break for the recess until October, the opposition Peoples Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) again sought to raise the issue of what they described as “the social state of the current crime situation”. This has been a constant mantra, but of no particular import since the most current police statistics suggests otherwise.

Editor, of course, there is crime, but certainly not on the frightening scale that had paralysed even the initial responses of the Guyana Police, during the early criminal onslaught which began in 2002.

In seeking to paint the Ministry of Public Security as having no interest in ensuring the safety of every Guyanese citizen, is as egregious, as it is misleading, given the many measures in terms of both budgetary allocations, and material resources that are a continuous feature of the David Granger administration’s determination to make citizens safer in their homes and communities.

One of the successes of the ministry since 2015 has been an improved and better working relations with communities, which have led to a higher solving rate of serious crimes, more than at any other time in the country’s law enforcement history. This has led to better intelligence-led investigations, with a noticeable faster rate of apprehending suspects. One should add the many cold cases that have been solved.

The PPP/C should be reminded as to what their desultory state of government caused to be descended on the nation, inclusive of bloody murders that have left so many children without fathers, wives without husbands, and mothers who would have lost their sons and other family members. To this day, they cannot find closure to their sons who had disappeared during that most horrific era, never to be seen again, dead or alive. It has to be recorded as the most frightening period in this country’s social life, especially in its modern history.

The psycho social damage has been enormous, in terms of the trauma that is still evident among bereaved families. The Lindo Creek Massacre, and the agonising pain that the surviving family members of those murdered still experience, is a seminal example of a past government which did not even have the basic of human decency to mount an inquiry into the horrific murders. Such an investigation was finally done when the current coalition administration ordered an inquiry.

Thus, the PPP/C opposition should cease attempting to spread fear among citizens, and pretending that it is concerned about the safety of Guyanese, when it never offered as much a courteous word of sympathy to those murdered miners’ families. This was how much they cared about citizens. No one will delude themselves into believing that there are not incidences of crime in Guyana; but the latter is a much safer society since May 2015.

Regards,
Dillon Goring