Following last Monday’s tragic death of nine-year-old Tanesha De Souza after she fell into a pit latrine at the Santa Rosa Primary School, Moruca, many persons have been calling for flush toilets to be introduced at all schools throughout the country.
At the forefront of these calls are the child’s parents, Robin and Vanessa De Souza, who said they would never want any parent to experience what they did last Monday, when they were forced to look at their only daughter’s body covered in filth.
The father told Stabroek News that he could not understand “in this day and age with technology” that there are still pit latrines and he issued a strong call to the Ministry of Education to install flush toilets at schools. He pointed out that what was ironic was the fact that the school had flush toilets, which only teachers could use, and the nursery school located in the same compound also has flush toilets.
“They only have three toilets with two holes each for over 700 children,” the man said. His wife, who has been a teacher at the school for the past seven years, said that the school has two flush toilets, one for the male teachers and the other for the females, but only one is working so they all use the one toilet.
Leader of the Alliance For Change (AFC), Raphael Trotman, also joined the call stating that it is hard to believe in this day and age, which the government has been touting that all Amerindian villages are taken care of properly, a nine-year-child could die after falling into a pit latrine on her first day to school.
However, while the calls are being made Minister of Education, Shaik Baksh when contacted said that the ministry had no intention of phasing out pit latrines since these are internationally accepted as proper means of sanitation disposal.
He noted that a number of international organisations, such as PAHO, recognise pit latrines as proper means of faeces disposal. He described the death of the child as an “unfortunate accident” and said the ministry was awaiting a full report on the incident. He said the police were conducting an investigation to ensure that there was nothing criminal about the incident.
He suggested that there might have been some negligence as the young girl should have been sent to the toilet with someone who could have assisted her since she was ill. He said his ministry would be working on phasing out pit latrines from schools eventually, but noted that it would be costly and would take some years to be achieved.
Further, the minister said, in many parts of Guyana, including along the coast, pit latrines were still being used especially in those areas where water was not readily available. He pointed out that entire housing schemes have been constructed with pit latrines.
But way back in July 2003 when he was the Minister of Housing and Water, Baksh was singing another tune. According to a Government Information Agency (GINA) feature the minister encouraged residents of new housing areas to dispose of garbage “in a proper manner and construct flush toilets instead of pit latrines.”
However, he is correct when he says that PAHO has recognised pit latrines as an accepted means of the disposal of human waste. In September 2007, that organisation in collaboration with the UK Department for International Development (DfID) had advertised for contractors to construct ventilated improved pit (VIP) latrines and septic tanks in the Region Three (Essequibo Islands/West Demerara) area. Stabroek News had contacted PAHO/WHO to ascertain why pit latrines were still being built. And according to Bissoon, the only name given, who had said he was in charge of the project, the initiative was based on information contained in a Bureau of Statistics census which stated that over 50% of the population in Region Three used pit latrines. He had said the agency was looking to build about 700 pit latrines between Cornelia Ida and Tuschen in Region Three. He had also pointed out that Region Three was the second most populated region in the country following Region Four (Demerara/Mahaica). Bissoon had said the initiative was an interim solution to the sanitation problem as most of the latrines were not hygienic and could contribute to disease in the area. He had said the new project would have ensured that latrines were built in the most hygienic way thereby containing the smell by keeping the pits covered, which would also keep away flies.
Propaganda
Trotman told Stabroek News that while government’s propaganda has been that it was properly taking care of all Amerindian communities, a child died after she fell into a pit latrine at a school. He pointed out that while millions are being spent “on pomp and ceremony such as Carifesta” the basic needs of people are not being met.
He said that whole idea of good governance was just a sham, adding that it was ironic that at the beginning of Amerindian Heritage Month hinterland communities were suffering such tragedies. In addition to De Souza’s death, three children also perished in a fire at a Waramadong dormitory, which had no electricity. Trotman said this was happening when millions of dollars were also being spent on vehicles, air trips and “mouthing off” by the government.
De Souza had suffered another accident at age one when she fell into pond, resulting in the lost of her speech. Trotman said that it was very sad that God gave her back to her parents eight years ago only to have her die in such a tragic manner. “It is really a shame and I am really hurting, that the child could have died in such a manner,” he said.
Negligence
While Baksh is saying that negligence was involved in the child’s death because she was not sent to the toilet with an older person, her father said it was negligence on the part of the ministry, because it was the ministry, which had pit latrines still at schools. The father said he was also hurting that up to Friday afternoon no one from the ministry contacted the family to sympathise. “If the media can get our phone number and call us why nobody couldn’t call us and just offer condolence?” the man asked. He said that only the Regional Education Officer (REO) visited them while the Regional Democratic Council (RDC) assisted in the offsetting of some funeral expenses. The father said that not even the Regional Chairman made contact with them.
Stabroek News attempted to make contact with the Regional Chairman by the number rang out. “They should done with pit latrines; other schools in the hinterland have flush toilets,” the man said while stating that it was hard to believe that the oldest school in the hinterlands still provides pit latrines for its student population.
‘She was everything’
Vanessa De Souza described her daughter as “everything” to the family as she was their only daughter and their eldest child. She said the entire family was taking the death very hard especially their youngest son who is four years old. She explained that Tenesha spent a lot of time with the child since she was not attending school and the little boy was asking many questions, which she found difficult to answer.
“I try to answer them but sometimes I have to hide in my bedroom to cry,” she told Stabroek News. She said prior to Monday the child never attended school because of the accident she had when she was one year old. The woman said her daughter had gone to spend the weekend with her grandparents when she fell into a pond. According to Vanessa, for months her child remained in an unconscious state and it was the prayers and support of relatives and members of the community that saw her returning to consciousness.
“We would talk to her we would read to her and the first thing she did when she regained consciousness was smile. She smiled to a song her grandfather had also sung to her,” the woman said. Vanessa said that while her child spoke and walked before the accident she stopped doing these things after the accident. Initially after she regained consciousness she would roll on the ground to move and eventually started to use her knees and later learnt to walk. But she still could not speak fluently, even though she would say a word or two at times. The woman said as a teacher she taught her child at home and even took a course in education for special needs children as an option while she was studying for her teacher’s certificate to better take care of her daughter.
The woman said she observed that her child responded better when she was among children and she always wanted to take her to school but her father would object because of her condition. He finally relented to send her to school for the new school year but had some reservations on the morning and asked his wife if she was sure she wanted to take the child to classes.
The mother said she assured her husband that all would have been well and pointed out how excited the child was when she saw her first school uniform. “She couldn’t stop looking at herself when she was dressed in her uniform,” the woman recalled.
Vanessa said she took her child to school and after leaving her with a friend first she placed her in the classroom she would have been in with two teachers. She said she went to assembly but her daughter did not attend because she was a new student. She saw the child again after assembly and remembered her showing her a “neat little circle she drew on her book. I told her to draw another one, and I told her ‘good girl’ and I left. Her eyes were following me all the time and she waved,” the mother said.
The woman said she was about to mark her register when she heard someone shouting that a child was in the toilet hole. She said she sprinted out of the classroom and “start moving more fast when I hear someone said it was ‘Teacher Vanessa’ daughter.” She said when she reached the toilet, persons were crowded around and although she could have looked into the hole she saw nothing as it was very dark. Many persons, including parents, were attempting to pull out the wood on the toilet seat to make the hole larger but to no avail. “It was a retired teacher who somehow found an axe and with that the hole was made larger,” the woman said. She said a family friend squeezed himself though the hole and did not wait for the ladder that was requested and he pulled the child out.
The mother said the child’s heart was not beating but they felt a pulse and while many persons did not want to touch her as she was covered with filth, she attempted mouth-to-mouth resuscitation but that did not help. By this time her husband arrived on the scene and “he was very angry he ask me if this is what ah bring she to school for.”
Vehicles were called and one took the child to the hospital and was met by the nurse, doctor and medics who were also summoned. They started working on her before she reached the hospital but she was pronounced dead on arrival.
The woman said her daughter was accustomed to pit latrines as that was what she used at home but the hole was not that big. She said while they have had toilet issues before residents had just complained about the dilapidated condition of the former pit latrines and had lobbied for new ones to be built. The one that Tenesha met her death in was one of the new ones.
Since the tragedy, a Parents Teachers Association meeting was convened but the parents said they did not attend. She said the child’s grandfather attended the meeting and he said even though the issue was on the agenda he had to raise it before it was addressed. And he made the parents’ feelings known, which was that the pit latrine at the school should be gotten rid of.
Since the death of the child, the children have been afraid to use the toilets. Vanessa said she has since lobbied for the toilet her daughter died in to be dismantled. While there was some resistance to this, she said it has since been torn down and the hole filled.
“We just want this hurt we are going through that no other parent feels it,” the woman said.
