Dudus: The Extradition of Ja’s #1 Drug Don (Part V)
As a self-confessed political animal, the machinations of the Government of Jamaica (GOJ) to delay and frustrate the extradition of Jamaica’s premier drug lord, Christopher ‘Dudus’ Coke, was political theatre. Extradition, normally a trivial procedural matter, became politically radioactive during the Dudus affair.
The Jamaican public was treated to the spectacle of the Government seemingly aiding a fugitive, a military-police incursion into Tivoli Gardens, involving mortar fire and armed resistance, and finally, the ignominious electoral defeat of the incumbent regime.
If the Dudus affair was not tragedy, it would be farce. It is unsurprising, therefore, that information surrounding the affair has been quick to dissipate from the public consciousness.
The records (transcripts and circulated documents) of the two commissions of enquiry have not hitherto been published.
To this end, this archival study is an attempt to place in an easily accessible format selected documents and highlight certain excerpts of the transcripts of exchanges in both commissions.
Over the next few weeks, The Sunday Gleaner will be publishing excerpts from Dr Paul Ashley’s book Dudus: The Extradition of Jamaica’s #1 Drug Don.
CHAPTER 5 GOVERNMENT OF JAMAICA MACHINATIONS
The likelihood of an extradition request: The Jamaica Labour Party administration had been officially informed as early as October 2007. Dr Peter Phillips, the former minister of national security in the People’s National Party administration, had been contacted by the United States authorities – the then United States Ambassador and her Drug Enforcement Administration representative – to use his “good offices” to set up a meeting with the incumbent Prime Minister Bruce Golding.
No request came down in 2007. Bruce Golding himself corroborated the account by the former minister of national security during cross-examination by Patrick Atkinson, QC, to wit, that the US ambassador, on October 29, 2007 told him that the indictment had already been handed down by a court in New York.
At the Vale Royal briefing on Monday, August 24, 2009, Commissioner of Police (COP) Hardley Lewin “expected a serious hunkering down: that what ifs, what are your plans, what do you expect, etc., in regard to this matter”. Instead, the prime minister said: “Well I have been briefed.” So the COP and the Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) saluted smoothly and left.
THE OPERATIONAL PLAN OF THE SECURITY FORCES
The security forces, namely the Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF) and the Jamaica Defence Force (JDF), developed independent plans, although there were joint meetings and a formal joint strategy. The JCF plan: ‘Operation Keywest’ was completed in January 2010. The date of the completion of ‘Operation Garden Parish’ by the JDF has not been made public.
The CDS was not familiar with the term ‘Keywest’; neither was the DCP c/o Operations aware of ‘Operation Garden Parish’. The capacities of the JCF were recognised as insufficient to deal with the armed resistance being mounted by Dudus in TG (Tivoli Gardens). The JDF took the lead and instituted its core guideline for a military operation: the need-to-know principle.
Accordingly, the political directorate, especially the prime minister and the minister of national security, were kept out of the loop with only military updates supplied once the ‘Tivoli incursion’ started under the declared limited state of emergency.