Is Guyana becoming a savage state? Former President David Granger asked the question, rhetorically, while examining the recent ruthless rape and murder of Ninawattie Nandalall in a village in the East Berbice-Corentyne Region on the programme – The Public Interest. He warned that the Region, with the nation’s second largest population, is in danger of being tainted with a reputation for a high rate of savage crimes – including murder, rape, robbery with violence, robbery under arms and piracy.
Mr. Granger cited evidence that victims of rape-murders have often been young schoolgirls, single mothers or old women living alone in villages with low levels of human safety. Assailants seemed to be acquainted with their victims’ vulnerability, defencelessness and day-to-day habits and showed disdain for the criminal justice system. Evidence suggested, also, that most rape-murders since 2000 occurred in villages in the Essequibo Islands-West Demerara and in the East Berbice-Corentyne Regions. Women have been stripped naked, raped and left lying in public places; gang-raped and drowned in backdam canals. Some were aged, blind, shut-ins and young pre-teen schoolgirls.
The former President reminded that PPP administrations never seriously enforced tough measures to curb lawlessness and seemed tolerant to violence on the Corentyne that has always been the bedrock of its political support. Official attitudes, inevitably, allowed other forms of violent crime to flourish.
PPP political machinations were behind the ominous motorcade to celebrate the elections victory in August 1961; the first political murder to prevent the elections by staging a ‘Hurricane of Protest’ in March 1964; the timely strike in the sugar industry to coincide with the elections in December 1968; the fatal instigation to prevent the removal of ballot boxes in the elections in July 1973; and the ‘contrived’ post-elections disorder in March 2020. Present-day village violence is a consequence of yesteryear’s political violence.
The Corentyne-born historian Professor Clem Seecharan described the 1964 GAWU strike as “an orgy of arson, bombing and personal attacks on people who refused to strike” [and] “…Dr. Jagan exploited his considerable influence among Indian sugar workers to achieve political objectives which had more to do with his control of the state than with their conditions of work…from the late 1940s to the late 1990s.”
Mr. Granger warned of the insensitivity and incompetence of law-enforcement agencies and the indifference of the political administration to the causes of this crime. Women’s safety, however, can be enhanced by the correct application of the Community Policing system, Neighbourhood Police scheme and Citizens Security Programme in positive, pro-active and preventive ways. These measures, in their orthodox forms, promote partnerships and problem-solving techniques to improve human safety by building mutual trust between the police and the community. Vigilant, compared to ‘vigilante’ community and neighbourhood policing, properly practised – could identify dangerous situations and protect persons at risk and, possibly, prevent rape- and wife-murders.
The former President recalled that the Guyana Human Rights Association’s reports – Without Conviction: Sexual Violence Cases in the Guyana Justice Process and, Justice for Rape Victims: Islahat of Laws and Procedures in Guyana – warned, twenty years ago, that the conviction rate for rape cases decreased even as the number of reported rapes increased. The PPPC administration could learn the lessons of this research and realise that its approach to women’s safety has been ineffective. A comprehensive national campaign is needed to eliminate rapes and rape-murders and to create a cohesive society in which our women and girl children could enjoy a safe and good life.