Colin John, a former police commissioner who resigned less than three months ago, will be sworn in as the senior magistrate of St. Vincent and the Grenadines today. PM Gonsalves’ decision to nominate and gain the appointment of Colin John as senior magistrate demonstrates that this government is willing to stick its dirty fingers into the eyes of major segments of the Vincentian community. It lives on discord and strife and has lost touch with public feeling.
Commissioner John has done well for himself via hard work, discipline, devotion, and good fortune. During his 35-year career in the public sector, he advanced from police officer to trained lawyer, assistant Director of Public Prosecutions, and police commissioner.
During Mr. John’s five-year tenure as chief of police, crime and violence, including homicides, spiralled out of control. Homicide records have been broken in the last three years, with the country posting 40, 42, and 51 homicides so far in 2023, with four weeks remaining. Our SVG has earned the dubious distinction of Caribbean Killing Fields and murder capital.
But it was not for these transgressions that Mr. John drew the ire of a sizable portion of the populace. Many considered him as an unquestioning servant of the Gonsalves regime. His willingness to hound opposition activists with police roughhouse tactics during protests, the speed with which he dragged people before courts on trumped-up charges that fizzled, and his arrogance when dealing with requests for information caused many well-wishers to lose trust and confidence in his tenure.
As a result, when John ultimately left the police force in September, the keenest watchers among us saw no feud between the prime minister and John, but rather a feeble attempt by Gonsalves to appear to be doing something about the country’s terrifying homicide rate.
As senior magistrate, John will preside over one of the country’s busiest courts. It will be interesting to see how he moves from officer to prosecutor to magistrate. What is more concerning is how he will handle instances in which he played a key role. We can expect him to recuse himself, or for astute defence counsel to do so. The inquiry into the death of Cjae Weeks, Kension King’s sedition trial, and other similar examples spring to mind.
Mr. John, a young professional in his mid-50s, needs more opportunity to advance in his work. However, this appointment fails the perception test. He should not be hearing cases that he and his former police colleagues started less than three months ago.
John’s selection also draws attention to another issue: the administration’s preference for former police officers as magistrates. Three of the four magistrates appointed today will be retired or active police officers. Bertie Pompey, a former deputy commissioner, was appointed as a magistrate in 2016. John Ballah, a former assistant superintendent of police, was appointed magistrate in June. Prior to his appointment, he led the police force’s Legal Research and Policy Unit.
Over 90% of all disputes in the country are heard and resolved by magistrates’ courts. The risk of appointing three former police officers as magistrates is that their training and experience do not allow for a diversity of viewpoints. People with diverse backgrounds and training will provide a more comprehensive sociological understanding of the reality that leads to conflict and crime.
This government’s preference for former police officers as magistrates indicates a harsh stance on crime and a desire for “police justice.”
A war criminal dies at the age of 100.
Henry Kissinger, Secretary of State under Richard Nixon, passed away Sunday at the age of 100. Kissinger will be recognised for his long career as a diplomat, security strategist, and politician as one of the most infamous war criminals who dodged responsibility for war crimes committed over his long career.
Kissinger was the intellectual architect of the structural adjustment project designed to draw South American governments into the US orbit. He honed his nasty art on Chile’s elected socialist Salvador Allende. Kissinger and Nixon urged the CIA to devise a strategy to make the “Chilean economy scream” in order to lay the stage for the military removal of the Allende administration.
Kissinger and Nixon, both fervent anti-communists, presided over the American war machine that resulted in the deaths of almost 7 million Vietnamese throughout the Vietnam War, which ended in America’s humiliating defeat in 1975. Many more Cambodians and Laotians were killed during America’s bombing war in Indochina.
Kissinger’s main diplomatic achievement was his secret conversations with Chinese leaders, which resulted in the breakup of China and the former Soviet Union. The death of Henry Kissinger today brings new global attention to his front-row seat and directives on many of the efforts for which he became famous — détente with the USSR, opening to China, and Middle East shuttle diplomacy.
This historical record also documents the darker side of Kissinger’s controversial presidency: his role in the overthrow of democracy and the rise of dictatorship in Chile; his contempt for human rights and support for dirty, even genocidal, wars abroad; secret bombing campaigns in Southeast Asia; and involvement in the Nixon administration’s criminal abuses, including secret wiretaps of his top aides.
The fact that such a man might live to reach 100 years old and be praised rather than perish in a maximum security jail demonstrates the world’s level of unfairness.
