MINISTER of Public Security Khemraj Ramjattan has noted that significant improvement will come to the country’s prisons services, police force and other agencies with the approval of over $21.6B to the central ministry.

During the consideration of the 2019 Budget estimates on Friday in the Parliamentary Committee of Supply, it was noted that over $3.9B will be injected into the Prison Service.
On the topic, Opposition Member of Parliament (MP) Clement Rohee questioned the minister on whether he is satisfied with the strength of the prison service countrywide and if not, to provide the steps being taken for improvement.

“No, I’m not satisfied,” Ramjattan began. “Restructuring the organisation is a big [aspect we’re working on]; increasing salaries and proposing how we get the monies for that; promotional increments; a number of things that go with making the prison service far more attractive and appealing for members and also getting recruits that would want to work in an environment of a prison are all things that we are working on.”

Meanwhile, another opposition MP, Harry Gill questioned Ramjattan on what measures the ministry has in place to stop the smuggling of prohibited items in to the prisons. “It has to do with the surveillance systems that we’re going to get through this budget and also professionalism that we would have to [develop] by process of continuously training and [addressing] the leadership of the prison, talking to these ranks [encouraging them] not to do that. Also, personal judgement calls made by these officers and ranks [must be addressed]…and we have to have a culture too, in and around the country, that family members shouldn’t be paying them the monies to carry in the contrabands to the holding bays in the first place. So all of that are considerations,” Ramjattan said.

To further improve the country’s prison service, in 2019, out of a sum of $7M monies have been set aside to increase support for the agriculture development plans to make prisons self-sufficient meat and vegetable wise. “We have certain projects that we’re going to do, we’ve gotten an agricultural officer so and this increase of $7M we feel will help in that regard,” Ramjattan said.

Questioning the decrease in spending in line item ‘other’ from $73M in 2018 to $25M in 2019, Rohee added that it is due to the construction of permanent structures such as toilets—as opposed to renting them—at holding bays at the Lusignan and Georgetown Prisons.

Also, in 2019 $1.4B of capital expenditure will go towards the construction and expansion of prisons and payment of retention. Ramjattan told the Committee that these retention payments will facilitate the construction of the Georgetown Prison at $6.1M; the reconstruction of the Camp Street Prison at $265M; the expansion of the Mazaruni Prison at $709M and consultancy services at $77M.

Consultancy has also been procured to design the new Georgetown Prison at the cost of some $10M and is being conducted by an American company which has designed prisons for a number of countries in the Caribbean and Latin America. The design for the steel-cell prison boasts a cell-modular arrangement which is easily portable.

Challenged to say whether it would be best to relocate the Georgetown prison to a place far away from residents and businesses, Ramjattan said:
“That is the reason we adopted the steel cell modular form that is portable because at the moment, we do not have a space whereby we can have it as secure as Camp Street where we can put a prison that can accommodate about 240 more prisoners. We cannot find that place yet.”

“Plus, when you’re doing considerations for having a prison you have to have remand prisoners that will come to court early or in time for the trials and all of that. So, if we put it too far we might have a traffic problem…but rest assured that the experts are giving us advice as to where we should have a huge modern prison that can take care of a 1,000 to 1,200 prisoners.”

He noted that there has been no change in the design of Mazaruni Prison since last revised to now be built as a 2-storey building. Thus far 20 per cent of this construction is completed at the cost of some $500M and the entire project is expected to be completed in 2019.

GUYANA POLICE FORCE
Regarding the Guyana Police Force (GPF), this agency will receive $13.8B.
Out of this sum, $220M will purchase equipment, arms and ammunition for the force while he noted that the entire SWAT team will be benefiting from the initiative. Another $200M will ensure the purchasing of vehicles, motorcycles, engines, boats and bicycles.
Referencing the fleet of vehicles presented to the GPF by the People’s Republic of China in 2017, Ramjattan said that with this additional support, the team’s emergency response time has improved.

Meanwhile, regarding police stations, Ramjattan noted that Regions One, Four, Five and Eight will be transformed into divisional headquarters.
“It is part of the realignment of the divisions into a regional division so we’re going to have ‘Region One Police Force’…up to ten rather than ‘A’, ‘B’, ‘C’, ‘D’ up to ‘F’,” he said. “We want a Commander, a Senior Superintendent or Assistant Commissioner to be the person who’s going to be living there, taking charge of all matters there.”

Facilitating this venture will be the sum of $400M which will go towards the completion, construction and rehabilitation of police stations, buildings, quarters and payment of retention. The headquarters to be involved include divisional headquarters in Golden Grove – $50M; Mabaruma – $50M; Mahdia – $50M and Fort Wellington – $50M.

Meanwhile, on the topic of plans for a GPF Aviation Unit, the minister said that the matter is still being addressed as “very qualified” persons will be needed to manage the unit.
“It’s an ongoing process but we’re going to get there. I cannot say whether we’re going to get there by the end of 2019 but certainly work will start,” he said. Other agencies for which funding was approved include the Police Complaints Authority – $44M; the Fire Service – $1.9B; the Customs Anti-Narcotics Unit (CANU) – $349M and the Policy Development and Administration – $1.4B.