Pandemonium broke out at the St Gabriel’s Primary School yesterday morning when a cutlass-wielding man went looking for a teacher who had earlier put him out of the school compound because of his attire.
A child suffered a skin wound from the cutlass as the man climbed the stairs. Following the confusion many parents turned up at the institution and took their visibly traumatised children home. One guardian has since reported that his child is begging not to return to school because she is scared.
The man’s action saw teachers and students alike scurrying out of his path and the headmistress of the school being forced to walk from the school’s Oronoque Street location to the Alberttown Police Station for help after the station’s number rang out. Another teacher jumped on the motorbike of a passer-by and also headed down to the station while the president of the school’s Parent/Teachers Association, Henry Rodney, also drove to the said station to seek help. By the time they returned to the location the man, and another who was standing at the gate with what looked like a gun in his waist, jumped the back fence and made good their escape.
According to Rodney, whose wife operates the canteen at the school, he was in the canteen just after 10 am when he heard a male teacher saying in a loud voice, “to get out of the compound.” He said he then heard a female’s voice using expletives and when he went to investigate he saw the young lady and a male dressed in a “dingy vest and short pants” leaving the school’s compound. He said the teacher related that the suspect entered the compound, the school is said to be near to a drug yard, and the teacher asked him to leave.
The young woman who said she was the young man’s brother alleged that there was a scuffle between the teacher and her brother and the teacher slapped him. Rodney told Stabroek News that about three minutes after they left the suspect returned wielding a cutlass and he went up to him and told him that there was a better way to handle the situation. He said the man appeared to have calmed down when his sister, who was standing across the street, declared, “he ent suppose to slap me brother,” and this triggered the rage in the young man again.
“When I looked at him his eyes were wild and he appeared to be hallucinating and he said, ‘nobody touch me!'” Rodney said, before he went up the school stairs wielding the cutlass. He said it was at this point the child sustained the injury. He said that the cutlass man went into the classrooms looking for the teacher as students and teachers scampered around the building. Some of the children were screaming as they ran. Rodney said he wanted to go and attempt to subdue the cutlass man but then he saw another man, who he learnt was the suspect’s brother, standing at the gate with what appeared to be a gun in his waist. After seeing this Rodney said that he decided not to take such action and it was at that point he decided to drive to the station. He said the police responded promptly in a vehicle and he drove behind them. Rodney added that he saw the female in a yard and reported this to the police but by the time they responded she had also left that location. Two other men, one with a cutlass, were arrested but the cutlass wielding man and his brother and sister were nowhere to be found.
Rodney said the headmistress contacted the ministry and before the official asked about the welfare of the teachers and children the official instructed that the teachers should not speak to the media. The PTA president said this angered him. He pointed out that up to 3 pm yesterday afternoon no official from the ministry visited the school even though they promised to do so.
“But for the smallest thing like a teacher not writing up his or her report they would reach the school,” Rodney said. When Stabroek News asked Minister of Education, Shaik Baksh, about the issue yesterday afternoon he said he was not aware of it.
“What is bothering me is that the Ministry of Education found that it made no sense to have a security guard during the day in the school compound,” Rodney said pointing out that on at least two occasions persons have walked off the road and robbed teachers by picking up their bags from classrooms. He said on another occasion a bicycle was stolen from the school’s stairway in the same manner.
He said that the headmistress was asking the ministry officials if the children should be sent home for the remainder of the day after the ordeal but no one gave her any instructions.
Rodney said a meeting would be held today on the issue and a decision would be made on what stance should be taken on the security and safety of the children and teachers. (Heppilena Ferguson and Oluatoyin Alleyne)
