Soldiers sheltered cops during Buxton attack
- army official
Stabroek News
September 18, 2002
The policemen who were attacked at Buxton on Sunday were provided with shelter by the army ranks, a Guyana Defence Force (GDF) official said yesterday.
The statement came after an eyewitness told this newspaper that the GDF ranks on the ground that day had moved away from the policemen shortly before they were attacked. Some citizens have cried foul at the army’s response to the incident on Sunday, saying that the policemen were attacked in their presence and they did nothing to restrain the villagers.
Staff Sergeant Stanford Conway told this newspaper that an army patrol in the area was joined by police ranks on Sunday afternoon. During the army’s patrol there was no incident but as soon as the police party joined the patrol at Brushe Dam, a group of women assembled and began hurling missiles at them.
During the melee, the police ranks withdrew behind the soldiers who provided them with shelter at which time the pelting stopped.
Residents of Buxton have shown more outward appreciation for the soldiers while publicly stating their displeasure with the police operation in the village.
Conway said that the GDF would usually dispatch two patrols in the area on a regular day. This newspaper understands that after leaving the GDF base at Buxton the ranks would proceed to the Vigilance Police Station where they would pick-up a few police officers to go on the patrol.
A villager claimed that on Sunday at around 11:45 a.m., a police vehicle went into the village with a man who said he had been robbed by Buxtonians. The resident said the vehicle which was carrying more than three policemen drove into the village with the man going at a fast rate down Brushe Dam and turning right into Wilkin street. When it reached the corner of Friendship Middlewalk and Wilkin street, the policemen discharged several shots in the air and sped out the village turning right on the embankment and headed further up the East Coast.
The resident said that at the time there was no GDF patrol in the area.
On Saturday, five young police constables had braved the hostility of the villagers and re-entered the village during a joint army/police operation, but they were not spared taunts and derogatory remarks.
Meanwhile, Conway said that since Sunday’s attack, no police had joined the army’s patrol in the area. A Joint Services release issued on Saturday had stated that in the wake of heightened criminal activities within Georgetown, the East Coast and East bank, the GDF and the GPF had intensified law enforcement activities in their fight against crime.
The release said further that the patrols are a demonstration of the cooperation and coordination that exist between the two sister services.
Stabroek News observed a police patrol in the vicinity of Sparendaam yesterday while two GDF patrols were seen around Buxton and neighbouring villages.