- NEWSDAY.CO.TT - A la Une - 20/Aug 06:43

Missing ammo mystery deepens

IN FEBRUARY, panic broke out at Camp Cumuto. It was discovered that close to 28,000 rounds of military-grade 5.56 ammunition had vanished into thin air. The camp was locked down. Between February 7 and 8, a desperate search to find 35 metal cannisters that had gone missing ensued. The search came up empty-handed. But this month, new information came to light linking the munition’s disappearance to a senior military officer, sale to criminal gangs and a likely effort to cover up the whole affair. Disturbing are the fresh details in a Sunday Newsday exposé of August 17 on this matter. Military officials perform regular checks and audits, like the one from December 2022 to March 2023 that found all ammunition accounted for. However, the situation behind the scenes is, the exposé suggests, more chaotic. A July 14 board enquiry report by Lt Col Dwayne Edwards into the missing items found a “systematic breakdown in accountability,” discrepancies in the “reclassification” of the ammunition from operational to training, and, most damningly, indications of a “potential cover-up.” Such disclosures would unsettle at any moment. Amid the unease and uncertainty surrounding the ongoing state of emergency, reports of threats to Cabinet officials, the abrupt cancellation of Independence Day activities and an aborted regiment shake-up, they are positively alarming. There is some suggestion the missing ammunition factored into the National Security Council’s deliberations in relation to the declaration of the emergency on July 18. This, as pieces of the puzzle continue to fall into place. Further reports have linked the senior officer involved to graft and the cancellation of a military construction contract by Chief of Defence Staff Air Vice Marshal Darryl Daniel. None of it inspires confidence in the national security apparatus. The suggestion of a gang link surprises no one. The issue of regiment-stamped ammunition being found at crime scenes has bedevilled authorities for years. While the state’s focus in combatting gun crime has given primacy to the problem of firearms coming in through either ports or porous borders, the unnerving possibility that the call has been coming from inside the house looms large. Ammunition with police and air guard markings have also been found at crime scenes; gangs have weapons such as the AR-15 which uses 5.56 ammunition. Straddling administrations, the Camp Cumuto mystery demands a robust and independent investigation. The former government moved to convene a Caricom team to do so. Whether that team began and completed its mandate, separate from army hierarchy, is unclear. That, too, is another cause for worry. Six months after this mystery emerged, the fact that it is yet to be solved, with findings published and arrests, if warranted, made, is an indictment of the state. The post Missing ammo mystery deepens appeared first on Trinidad and Tobago Newsday.