A young man who set off to work in the interior so his mother could accomplish her dreams of owning her own home has left her in distress instead as he has been reported missing.
Nita Bernard of Le Destin, East Bank Essequibo said she feared that her son, twenty-six-year-old Mario ‘Ameen’ Bernard is dead because a colleague from the mining company where he was employed brought out his bag.
She said the man could not give a proper explanation about her son’s whereabouts. The woman said her son left to go into the interior on February 3 and was expected to return home at the end of July.
She said when she received a call on March 11 that she should go to Zeelugt to uplift his bag from the man she was quite surprised. She sent one of her daughters for the bag and when she checked it she found some of his personal items missing.
Bernard said she sent a message to the man that she wanted to see him and he came two days later. He told her that Mario “bruk away from the crew with a set of boys and went somewhere else and left his bag.”
According to the woman the man said he brought out the bag because “the company was strict and they wouldn’t want him to go back there” after he left without telling them.
She said she made a report to the Parika Police Station since then because she suspected that something was amiss but the officers told her that they “do not look after that.”
She then contacted the owner of the company by telephone and he assured her that her son was ok. He even told her to go to his office in Georgetown the following day and she would hear his voice on the telephone.
However, before she could get to the office the owner called to tell her that he learnt that Mario went away and left his bag on a truck.
Bernard said she went to the office anyway and upon seeing her, an employee asked if she was the “dead boy mother.”
She responded that she never said that her son was dead but the worker did not say anything else and the “owner did not come out to talk to me.”
Not knowing what else to do, the woman decided to go to the Leonora Police Station a few days ago to make another report. The police took statements but by then the man who brought the bag had already returned to the interior.
Mario was a student of an Islamic School, the Darul Uloom at East Street, Georgetown and gave up his studies to seek employment with the company. Before that he was involved in contracting work.
Bernard said it was not her desire for her son to leave his studies and although “it grieved my heart” when he did, she did not stop him from going.
She lamented to this newspaper that she needs answers and that “wherever he is, if he is alive, money or no money, I want him to come home.”
