There is a sad sameness to several recent rape-murders. In two of the most savage, the victims were innocent schoolgirls in small rural villages. In both cases, the alleged assailants appeared to be underemployed, undereducated, unsettled juveniles.
One case was the rape-murder of 12-year-old Julie Sooklall at Wakenaam Island in November 2004 for which three juveniles were found culpable. The girl’s body was found, still dressed in her school uniform, not far from her home. Another was that of nine-year-old Sade Stoby whose violated body was found a mere 500 metres from her home in the enclave village of Mocha-Arcadia on the East Bank of Demerara. Two boys who lived in her community have been arraigned for trial for the crime. Sadly, there have been several other similar atrocities at Naamryck, Parika, Warren and elsewhere.
The administration would do well to look for lessons in these cases. It should consider the effects of deficiencies in education and the dearth of employment opportunities on the lives of young men in poor rural communities.
It is evident that part of the problem might arise from the education system. Minister of Education Shaik Baksh, addressing a workshop on “The Delivery of Quality Education in a System of Decentralised Education Management’ in June this year, regretted that decentralised education management had not delivered the desired or expected results. He felt that persons within the sector should focus not only on delivering education, but also on “moulding a proper value system in the schools so that the children will be better able to cope with the world.”
Mr Baksh’s words echo the very challenges that the former Guyana National Service was established to confront. It aimed at giving young people who had left the formal education system the opportunity to resume schooling and enter the world of work. The service had many sections including a young brigade and the cadet corps for schools and the pioneer corps for those out-of-school. All that is left of it is the new opportunity corps.
Some sections were compulsory for special categories of students and this requirement might have been a major mistake. Other sections, however, were voluntary; their activities were varied and valuable useful training and production were achieved. As in any public corporation today, administrative and managerial problems were manifold but many graduates admit that they did benefit from their service. The damaged parts, perhaps, could have been repaired rather than being demolished.
In explaining the administration’s decision to dismantle the service, President Bharrat Jagdeo acknowledged that although it definitely offered some discipline, it lacked the faculty to foster entrepreneurial skills among young people. “I think we need to get more of our young people into business, not only to get them into a military-type training organisation. We need to give them entrepreneurial skills. Let them become the businessmen of the future,” the President said. “If you put them back into the National Service, the focus tends to be more marching and walking etc. I want them to learn to read a balance sheet or how to manage money or learn some skill.”
The problem is that many school dropouts cannot read anything, least of all balance sheets. The administration, having dissolved the service, established several new schemes including the President’s Youth Award Republic of Guyana (PYARG), and the President’s Youth Choice Initiative (PYCI) over the past decade. The Young Entrepreneurial Skills Training (YEST) programme, administered by the Ministry of Culture, Youth and Sport, is directly involved in training out-of-school youths, allowing them a second opportunity to become employable.
These schemes all have good intentions. But do they have the capacity to absorb the enormous number of juveniles who drop out of school every year and the capability to reach into the rural communities, which suffer from poor education and employment opportunities? Have the PYARG, PYCI and YEST achieved the objectives for which they were established?
The sad story of Sade Stoby should not be casually dismissed as another crime of passion. Before the next chapter in the chronicle of abuse of innocent girl children comes to be written, the administration would do well to consider establishing a wider scheme for the education and employment of young people. Far too many of them are out of school and out of work with nothing to do all day long.