Latest update April 24th, 2024 12:59 AM
Jan 08, 2016 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom
Reports have begun to filter in about persons connected or believed to be connected to the former administration feeling nervous that they too, their homes and their families, may be subject to surveillance from the State.
These reports need to be confirmed, but given recent incidents, it would not be unusual to discover that the military intelligence unit of the Guyana Defence Force has begun to spy on private citizens who are at odds with the government.
The military undertakes its own intelligence gathering. This information is strictly for national security purposes. It is concerned with gathering intelligence about insurrections, civil disturbances, border movements and illegal aliens. This is the scope of military intelligence.
Military intelligence is not concerned with white collar crime. The military has always been concerned with the gathering of political intelligence to guard against internal disturbances. It is therefore surprising for the media to be told that the military was lending support to the police, and this is how one of its soldiers was staking out the home of a civilian who lived next door to the former head of NICIL, Winston Brassington.
When it comes to the intelligence services, it is not likely that the police or any of its arms is going to ask military intelligence for assistance. Intelligence agencies do not have operational coordination and cooperation. They rarely exchange information and they are not going to be involved in joint intelligence-gathering information. That is highly unusual, not just in Guyana, but anywhere in the world. Intelligence agencies do not have joint operations to gather information.
The police and the army do undertake joint operations. Operation Dragnet was one such operation, but in that operation the military was confined to operations against illegal aliens and border patrols, while it was the police that were undertaking patrols and road blocks against criminals.
Historically, there has been an undercurrent of mistrust between the army and the police. It does not manifest itself in major spats, but the tensions are there. The police feel that the army believes that it is a superior agency. The police feel that the army is pampered and treated better than the police.
Burnham did in fact place greater trust in the army than in the police, and he relied more on the army to do his political misdeeds than he did in the police. After the incident in which the Ministry of National Development was burnt down in the late 1970s, Burnham fired the then head of the army for failing to prevent the attack.
In so doing, he felt that the army had an obligation to protect the office of the General Secretary of the PNC which was housed in that Ministry. The head of the police intelligence service was not fired. The head of the army was fired, because Burnham felt that the army should have always had his back.
Afterwards, he made his changes in personnel, and began to favour the army to do his dirty work, even though the then riot squad of the Guyana Police Force did assist in breaking up political meetings of opposition parties.
This favouring of the army led to problems between the two main joint services organizations. This suspicion between the two agencies still exists.
If anyone wishes to confirm this fact, speak to any member of the police force and ask them about the support the police got from the army during the Buxton upheavals. Then you will get a better idea of the undercurrents that exist between the two agencies of the joint services.
The recent incident involving the death by accident of an army sergeant attached to the army’s intelligence unit has raised serious questions about the role of the army intelligence services, and whether they are once again coming under political direction and dictation.
This is why there needs to be an investigation into the death of Sergeant Pyle and his wife. There needs to be a full investigation. This matter cannot be swept under the carpet. Lives have been lost and people are fearful that Big Brother is watching, listening to their phone conversations, and tapping into their emails.
The American, British and Canadian diplomatic missions that were up in arms when the PPP prorogued parliament have said nothing about this recent tragedy, and its implications for the freedom of Guyanese. They surely by now must recognize the dangers that this country faces if Guyana reverts back to being a police state.
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