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Human Rights in Guyana

Ravi Dev for KN 3-5-04

            Last month, the U.S. State Department released its report on the 2003 Human Rights situation in Guyana. I received quite a few outraged calls complaining that the report was biased. The report emphasised that “the security forces killed 39 civilians during the year, compared with 28 in 2002.”  “What about all those people murdered on the East Coast? What about all the businessmen killed by bandits? Aren’t they humans? Don’t they have rights? Is it because  most of these people were Indians that they’re not worth talking about?”

            Well indeed they are worth talking about. But we need to understand what’s this thing called human rights to find out whether there is any “partiality” going on. While the report did not mention that the overwhelming majority of those killed by the Police were Africans, it was obvious that it was against this nugget of local knowledge that the comments were being made. The criticism only underscored the fact that the evaluation of the ethnic impact of almost any event,  is the norm in Guyana.

            “Human  Rights” is a peculiarly Western notion that came out of their historical experience where, after much struggle, it became accepted that the individual had certain inherent rights that had to be protected  against the excesses of an always potentially tyrannical state. It should be very obvious then, that the Western focus was on the protection of “political” rights of the citizens against the state. After World War II, the newly formed United Nations very quickly drafted and adopted the “Universal Declaration of Human Rights” in 1948. Article 3 proclaimed that “Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of persons.” Even though the Socialists and Communist states protested the focus on the protection of political rights (causing separate Covenants on “Civil and Political Rights” and “Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights” to be promulgated by 1966) they accepted the premise that violations of political rights – especially the crucial “right to life and security” - were to be protected against the state.

            And this is why the U.S. Department’s report on Human Rights in Guyana (as well as the Guyana Human Rights Association’s reports) have focused on the actions of the government – through its various agencies such as the Police and the Prison Forces –on civilians. However, apart from the complaints of my outraged friends mentioned above, it should be obvious to all (not only in Guyana) that there are serious shortcomings with this state-centred approach to Human Rights violations.

In Rwanda, Serbia/Kosovo and Sierra Leone, the world looked on in horror as private forces outmatched government forces in inflicting death and destruction on fellow citizens. The International community was forced to reorient its thinking (albeit slowly) on how it looks at Human rights violations. The earlier caution stemmed primarily on the tacit acceptance of the world state-system that the internal matters of states were basically their own business. Events in the three countries mentioned were turning points and precipitated specific UN International Tribunals to bring the perpetrators of the extreme violators of human rights – both governmental and private – to justice. We also now have an International Criminal Court.

            Closer to home, the recent ouster of President Aristede has brought these issues into our front-yard. Most Caricom nationals (including Guyanese) welcomed the initiative of the US, the UN and their own Governments to install a democratic regime to Haiti. We witnessed the criticisms of the human rights violations of the private death squads, drug gangs and other private forces, in addition to the alleged government sponsored ones. Aristede’s installation, removal and reinstallation during the last decade kept the problem of private violations of human rights in front of our eyes. In the run-up to Aristede’s current ouster, many local citizens, in addition to our Caricom governments (including the Government of Guyana) have denounced the operations of the private forces, which in fact, may have provided the US with the only credible reason for its alleged spiriting of Aristede out of the country – to prevent greater bloodshed.

            And this brings us to the situation in Guyana and to my complainants’ implicit criticism of a double standard in the Human Rights analyses in Guyana. Events here should have brought the issue of private violations of human rights into our very living rooms. With the broadening of the perspective, during the last decade, on Human Rights violations to encompass the activities of private forces against civilians, it is difficult to accept that events in Guyana were consistently reported and analysed from only the state-centred perspective. Are we waiting for a Rwanda to occur here before we accept that not only the State can violeate the human rights of large groups of citizens? In 1998, GIFT had to demonstrate that organised gangs of mostly African youths, assaulted hundreds of primarily Indian citizens. No reports of human rights violations. During that year dozens of primarily Indian businessmen were murdered. No reports of Human Rights violations. Without any sustained
break, the violations continued. By 2002, following the Republic Day prison break-out, kidnapping, rapes and open attacks of Indian villages by bandits located in Buxton became the norm. No reports of Human Rights violations.

            However, in line with the old norm the excesses of the Black Clothes against primarily African youths had been duly reported. Similarly, when the death squads (evidently both officially and privately sponsored) also began to litter the highways and byways of Guyana with the bodies of African youths, they were duly noted and calls for redress, rightfully were heard.

            What ROAR has been pointing out is that this apparent distinction in the evaluation of gross human rights violations in Guyana leads to further deepening of the ethnic divide, because this is the fault-line along which the differential treatment are seen. Those who are now calling for an investigation of the possible governmental role in the operations in death squads against primarily African youths, must also just as vociferously insist that the investigation include the violations against Indians by primarily African bandits. Those individuals who so eloquently (and rightly) have raised their voices of morality against the private death squads who prey on innocent supporters of Aristede must do the same against those who prey on the (perceived) supporters of the PPP. To do otherwise would be to lose our moral right to criticise.

            Finally, isn’t it the height of irony for the PPP Government to join with others in Caricom to call for an investigation into the circumstances surrounding the departure of Aristede - because of allegations that the US was involved. Did anyone provide written statements on the allegations to the Guyana Government?