President deems national stakeholders meeting successful
-hopes that spirit of cooperation will continue

Georgetown, GINA, February 27, 2008

President Bharrat Jagdeo and several other stakeholders today described the national stakeholders meeting on crime held at the Office of the President as successful as most initiatives were agreed upon and presentations were good.
            Today’s meeting was also historical as it included all Parliamentary political parties including the People’s National Congress Reform (PNC/R) and  the Alliance for Change (AFC), religious organisations, the Chief of Staff of the Guyana Defence Force (GDF), the Commissioner of Police, Trade Unions, women’s organisations, the Guyana Human Rights Association (GHRA), the Guyana Bar Association (GBA), the Guyana Responsible Parenthood Association (GRPA), the Private Sector Commission and other representatives of civil society.  
            A joint press release was later issued to the media noting that the meeting discussed the national security plan and views by all stakeholders on how to address the serious escalation of crime in the society currently.
            “The national stakeholders held a cordial and constructive meeting at which it was agreed to (1) support the national security sector plan and its various components and (2) to tabulate all the recommendations which were presented for consideration and agreed that another meeting would be held in two weeks time to examine these recommendations”.  
            Commenting on the meeting today, President Jagdeo said it stemmed from a series of engagements he had last week with members of civil society and members of the Opposition parties. He described the previous meetings also as successful except for the PNC/R not agreeing to sign the agreement following the meetings, which spoke of the full support of the security forces to pursue the criminals and the unequivocal condemnation of the horrendous crimes that took place, particularly at Lusignan and Bartica recently.    
              “We agreed that today we will focus on a review of the Government’s security plan. A lot of people were not familiar with what we were doing so many of the suggestions that were coming in were things that were already being pursued and part of the national plan. What we have been asking for is additional suggestions to add to what we are already pursuing so we presented the security plan, 3 major areas,” the Head of State explained.
             The President pointed out that the security plan has 11 priority areas which includes the setting up of an anti-crime unit to analyse crime data and focus on high profile crime.
              He noted that the specialised police unit would deal with situations like the recent tragedies and would include specialised gun training and equipment.
            “We spoke about intelligence gathering, traffic management oversight, a whole range of things and those 11 priorities were approved since last year and we have been receiving assistance from the British government since then to put these things in place. Since Lusignan we have seen an acceleration of the help,” the President added.
             President Jagdeo explained further that the original plan would have gone over several years.
            Meanwhile, today’s meeting also saw presentation of the Government of Guyana and Inter-American Development Bank’s (IDB) Citizens’ Security programme, a US $25M project to restructure all police stations and to better equip them to work with  communities, especially vulnerable ones as well as to prevent youngsters from becoming prey to criminals or be easily recruited.
            “So, working to build better community /police relations as well as to create employment and training opportunities for young people in those areas,” the President emphasised.
             National stakeholders also witnessed a presentation of the Justice Sector Reform Programme which is focused on a significant reform of the justice system to allow for better justice and for strengthening of prosecutions and the moving away of the police   from prosecutions.
             “So, only the District of Public Prosecutions (DPP) would prosecute certain types of crimes. It means that we would have to hire more lawyers there to remove the preliminary inquiry for a whole range of crimes now where it take a long time to get the cases heard and to reform the rules of court and a number of things that would bring greater accountability to the judiciary and faster administration of justice,” President Jagdeo underscored.
            On this note he alluded to the death warrants which were signed several years ago and noted that they have been stuck in court.
            It was noted that following the presentations, comments from the various parties were received and these were favourable.
             “I said ‘look this programme is to deal with the short and medium term, it is not to be confused with what we have to do now, what we need now is for every one to support the efforts of the security services to hunt down these people, and that is the only thing that will bring relief to the people of this country,” the President concluded.

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