Outrage overtook grief at the Lyken’s Funeral Parlour yesterday morning, as upset relatives of the deceased army corporal Ivor Williams expressed disappointment at the “inferior coffin” provided by the Guyana Defence Force (GDF) for his burial.
On Wednesday last, several armed men ambushed a GDF vehicle returning to Camp Ayanganna from an administrative run in Berbice. The gunmen engaged the soldiers on the Railway Embank-ment Road between Church of God and Company roads, during which Williams lost his life.
A relative of Williams, who was formerly in the army, said she couldn’t understand how the army could do such a thing. According to the woman, the coffin provided by the GDF was of “inferior quality”. She explained that the wood was rough and the interior of the coffin was not properly lined. “Imagine,” she said heatedly, “they put newspaper underneath the cloth lining inside the coffin.”
The angry woman said Williams deserved better than that.
The woman, who was speaking on behalf of Williams’s mother, also said that everyone was concerned about the deaths of the 11 people from Lusignan and it seemed they had forgotten that Ivor Williams was also dead. Williams, she said, was a quiet and decent man and didn’t deserve to die the way he did.
Two cousins of the deceased soldier, Lentil Daniels and Paula Niles, said that the coffin provided by GDF was rejected and the family eventually provided a better one. The women said they were upset and concerned that no government official was present at the parlour yesterday. The army official present at the parlour declined to comment.
Williams’ body was transported to Hampton Court, Essequibo yesterday for interment.
