It has taken me some time to get to the David Simmons report on the 1990 coup attempt and even so I am still to read the 1,327-page document in its varied entirety. Nevertheless, I feel comfortable offering at least a few initial comments on and around the findings and recommendations of the commissioners.
The first comment is obvious: having come at least two decades too late the report lacks the potency of immediacy and freshness of accounts of what transpired, including testimony to the effect that it was sufficient to trigger at least suspicion by the security forces.
My own conclusion is that a prompt enquiry could have led to criminal investigations; but that did not serve the purposes of UNC and PNM campaigns for the elections of 1995, 2000/2001, as the two were busily engaged in known post-coup alliances with the Jamaat al Muslimeen, having group members as campaigners to place their parties in power and close to the treasury.
In the warm afterglow of the 1995 election victory, Panday gave what was said to be a first audience to Bakr and his "generals," while his Works Minister, the "Sheriff," handed over parts of the social welfare programme to the Jamaat.
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