PUBLIC Security Minister Khemraj Ramjattan has said he is not in agreement with removing the Special Organised Crime Unit (SOCU) from under the Guyana Police Force, neither does he believe that SOCU would be called upon to investigate cases which are to be dealt with by the security force.

However, he is arguing that Opposition Leader Bharrat Jagdeo’s contention that SOCU will now be involved in all police investigations is ludicrous.

“That’s not true!” Ramjattan declared on Friday. He told reporters that SOCU is a police unit and every police unit has to be involved in investigations of all kinds. “The emphasis here is on anti-money laundering offences and the anti-terrorist offences, and that which the Anti-money laundering provisions provide for. That is what they have been doing all along; and included in that would be financial crimes, white collar crimes etc.,” Ramjattan stated.

The Minister made it clear that SOCU’s Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) were not amended to facilitate new things.

“But if there is an anti-terrorist crime which results in murder, are you telling me that this unit will deal with the anti-money laundering [aspect] but when it comes to the murder they send it back to the homicide squad?” Ramjattan asked.

SOCU, the Minister said, will proceed with all the requisite investigations, because there are many inter-related components.

“I thought it was ludicrous that here…was a person…criticizing what we did by setting up the standard operating procedures and quarrelling with it, when they set up SOCU and never had any SOP…. And now you do something and he is yelling at you in relation to ‘Oh, they are going to catch thieves around the corner.’ That’s not what SOCU is all about,” Minister Ramjattan said.

Opposition Leader Bharrat Jagdeo said on Thursday that SOCU ought to remain within the Guyana Police Force, but that it should fight only financial crimes. In his opinion, should SOCU be separated from the GPF, Opposition figures would be targeted.

“You don’t know how they will act, and they will be influenced to take political action against opponents; and so we believe that the unit was set up under the police to support the FIU (Financial Intelligence Unit). The FIU doesn’t need a policing arm,” he said at a press conference held at Freedom House.

Jagdeo argued that the separation of the two would allow for mismanagement by those who fall within the body. He said that while the GPF may have unpredictable behaviours, it is “governed by laws, protocols, regulations and Standard Operating Procedures; so you can, 90 per cent of the time, anticipate how they will act,” as they are mandated to comply with the established rules.

Jagdeo’s comments followed those of Attorney General Basil Williams’s who wants SOCU to focus on fighting money laundering. Williams believes that being a unit within the Police Force may prove burdensome for SOCU. He said the Unit can ill afford to lose focus of its primary functions in policing the new Anti-Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism (AML/CFT) regime.

The Attorney General said, too, that his administration does not want to be accused of stymieing the operations of SOCU so as to hamstring progress under the AML/CFT legislation.

“So SOCU is a specialised agency and we have to work out… Nothing has come to Cabinet yet…to really determine its scope; but you know, being in the FATF world, the CFATF world, the impression I have (is that) SOCU is really to be a kind of independent body,” Williams told the media at a recent press briefing.

He said the Unit, an arm of the GPF, will have to be examined further. Asked whether he was suggesting that the current situation lends itself to interference, Williams said, “Well, it is embedded in the Guyana Police Force and the reporting arrangements; it would appear to be police commissioner and all that. Cabinet hasn’t really dealt with that issue, but it needs to address it. The important thing is that we cannot remove SOCU (from) its core functions, and that is to investigate crimes under the AML/CFT regime.”

Meanwhile, the Minister of Public Security said that while his opinion on the removal differs from that of the Attorney General and Minister of Legal Affairs’, there must be a collective decision on the way forward.

“I would still want it to come under the Police Force because it is a policing authority, and that’s my personal opinion. Of course we have to collectively agree. I think the Attorney General has a different perspective to the issue; and of course, like we do on everything right down to contracts, we will debate and then make a decision,” Ramjattan told reporters.

SOCU, which falls under the Police Commissioner, is responsible for financial crimes along with other crimes, including but not limited to, human, drugs and arms trafficking; murder, piracy, racketeering; counterfeiting as well as environmental crimes.