Why was Granger not interested in the Buxton Commission of Inquiry?
Kaieteur News – There are four types of player in what I refer to as Buxton disorder – 2002 to 2006. One group is the central players who were real killers. The second group consisted of their guides, advisers and propagandists. Ronald Waddell was the most prominent in the second group.
The third tier featured the propagandistic voices from the PNC, ACDA, Tacuma Ogunseye of the WPA, Mark Benschop, among others. The fourth dimension consisted of the media, some security officers and some businessmen who knew what was going on in Buxton and who provided logistical support, propagation and resources to the gunmen.
In the fourth dimension, President Bharrat Jagdeo stood at the time. As president, Jagdeo was receiving a mountain of knowledge from the first, second, and third formations. Mr Jagdeo won the 2006 elections and decided Buxton was a past event and wanted to focus on mega projects. He had in mind things like the Marriott Hotel, Skeldon sugar factory, Amaila hydro falls project, and the like. So confronting and exposing the PNC on Buxton was not Jagdeo’s priority.
Make no mistake; Jagdeo knew what was happening in Buxton and who was in contact with the gunmen. It has remained silent to this day. I figure the basic reason why Jagdeo has never exposed some key PNC players in Buxton’s chaos is simply because he never saw him bring any political capital to the PPP.
Also, I think he felt that the PPP survived Buxton’s attempt at racial war and confronting the PPP government, so it was a dead matter for him. But Jagdeo has damning information about people who have marched after 2015 as angels. I laugh when they do that because I know what they did in Buxton. Imagine Jagdeo has a lot more on them.
Two things to note about two catastrophic, violent, cataclysmic events in post-Independent Guyana – one is that President Burnham had a deep birthplace inside the WPA that led to many tragedies inside the WPA . The other is that Jagdeo had two important mounted balls in Buxton that informed him exactly who and who was planning to fire a volcano in Guyana.
Let me offer one immediate explanation – those two strategic informants of President Jagdeo did not include a specific man whose name was clearly Linden. His knowledge of Buxton was useful but he made a deal with the government after 2005 when the fire started to fade. I know for a fact that President Jagdeo receives video material that might have troubled some people if released after 2015.
So we come to the question, which forms the heading of this column. There were too many inquiry commissions (COIs) during Granger’s presidency. The first one Guyana predicted would be Buxton’s chaos. The PNC and WPA used the extra-judicial murders as a bandwagon to gain international support for its election campaigns in 2011 and 2015. Yet neither Granger nor the PNC showed any interest whatsoever in a judicial inquiry into the Buxton disorder – 2002-2006.
It seems we will never know the truth of everyone who emerged in Buxton and many who were assumed innocent personalities, certainly not innocent. It is doubtful whether the PNC will ever come back in power in decades to come or if ever the future of Guyana. The PPP is set to benefit massively from the self-destruction released by the PNC and the AFC in March – July 2020. The future PPP government will not have even the remotest interest in conducting an investigation in Buxton.
We still have to answer the question why Granger didn’t have a COI. One basic reason can be cited. It would have brought more damage to the PNC’s image than the PPP’s. COI would have damaged the PNC position and also the AFC. There was a big wig in the AFC that would have faced Granger if Granger had agreed to an inquiry.
Granger wasn’t a fool. Granger knew that there was material out there that was extremely convincing to the PNC, AFC and a certain cultural institution, materials that would have ended up in court. COI would have exposed Ronald Waddell’s vicious, violent, anti-Indian temperament. For those who don’t know, the PNC was not an innocent bystander of Buxton’s chaos. Some people we think are respected, not prominent politicians. Judicial set-up for Buxton would have destroyed them. So I guess they live to fight another day unless Mr. Jagdeo reveals them in his biography. But then again; they can sue for libel.
(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of this newspaper.)