What
was the information which President Jagdeo had about
Clarke and which vindicated him
Dear Editor,
President Jagdeo has proclaimed that he had
“confidential information” indicating that retired
army major David Clarke was not serving the
army’s best interests. Mr Jagdeo stated
that he did not want to make the information
public. This is the same Major David Clarke who
when he was a Captain, initially led army operations
in Buxton during the crime wave. Let me see if I am
getting this right: the Commander-in-Chief of the
armed forces of Guyana had information indicating that
the very officer leading operations in an area that
was the centre piece of a crime upsurge was not
serving the army’s best interests and he did
not want to make the information public? The crime
wave ushered in one of the most savage and bloody
periods of fear and trepidation in Guyana’s history.
The people of Guyana enveloped in fear in
those times had a right to full disclosure about
the shortcomings of their security forces. Even
if the President did not want to publicly proclaim the
information he should have pressured the army to
remedy the situation expeditiously.
An army officer acting in contravention of
the army’s interest poses a serious
danger to the army and to the public. The
seriousness of that danger increases when that officer
is leading military operations of critical importance
to a nation’s security. Given Mr Jagdeo’s
statement about vindication, it appears that the army
brass and the Commander-in-Chief had a difference
of opinion regarding Clarke. The President does
not clarify on what basis he was vindicated
or what information was provided to him and
whether in turn this was communicated to the army and
guarantees his vindication. It begs the question
why he did not at a minimum order the army to remove
Clarke from his critical post and reassign him.
The basic requirement was for President Jagdeo
to err on the side of caution in favour of the
nation’s security. The fact that David Clarke
was never removed provokes questions about the
Commander-in-Chief’s handling of this
matter. The Commander-in-Chief is
expected to act in the nation’s interest even
if it means overriding the army.
The President indicated that he was vindicated
about Clarke but has not revealed the source of his
information or the nature of the information he
received. The only information suggestive of
Clarke’s allegedly harmful conduct publicly
produced to date are the cocaine trafficking
charges against Clarke, and Roger Khan’s alleged
claim that Clarke was acting in concert with
Shawn Brown. As such, the information available to the
public points to an alleged alliance with a known
criminal or alleged cocaine trafficking. If
either or both of these alleged activities were the
basis for the Commander-in-Chief’s legitimate
concerns at the time Clarke headed the Buxton
operations, the Commander-in-Chief should have shown
the fearlessness to act forcefully to remove him from
his position and place him under investigation.
Maybe it is time for the Commander-in-Chief
to reveal the actual information and his source
to the public. After all, the
information is several years old and may have
been disclosed in relation to a high-profile
case in the USA. The same information that is now
being publicly brandished as being always sufficient
to establish conduct contrary to the army’s
interests was not deemed actionable information then
upon which the Commander-in-Chief was confident enough
to remove, reassign or prosecute Clarke. In
the court of public opinion, it would seem that the
right thing to do now is for the President
to reveal the nature of the information and the
source of the information.
Yours faithfully,
Michael Maxwell