That was ten years ago but it is just one of the many experiences that miner Simona Broomes has had which motivated her to form the recently launched Guyana Women’s Miners Association of which she is president.
“That woman never peeped out from under the tarpaulin until we reached Bartica; when I was giving her water I had to push my hand under the tarpaulin. That is how scared she was of the man,” Broomes said in a recent interview with the Sunday Stabroek.
The woman hailed from Linden and Broomes later learnt she was a teacher who had been taken into the interior by her boyfriend to “see the place,” but he forced her to stay in the remote area cut off from her relatives and never allowed her to leave the camp or speak to anyone. Broomes seized her opportunity on a rare occasion when he was forced to leave the woman alone in the camp because she was unwell. She had to wait a while before approaching the camp as she was afraid the man might have returned suddenly.
“I had to do something, I just could not sit and watch him slap her, cuff her and just do anything he wanted to do with her,” Broomes said, adding that the fear she saw in the woman also drove her to take matters into her own hands.
The woman told her that she wanted to leave but everyone was afraid of her boyfriend and would not take her out, and she told her she had to stand up for herself and tell him she wanted to leave and when he refused she would intervene.
“She told him she wanted to leave as soon as he came back and he pick up a big wood and was about to hit her and I come out and say, ‘You dare not touch she, if she said she is not staying she is not staying.‘”
Today, the woman is married to someone else and has migrated, and Broomes said she was her maid of honour and would visit her whenever she was overseas. But she is still forced to put up with hostility from the man whom she would see from time to time in the interior. “His body language tells me that he has not forgotten me, but I did what I had to do,” Broomes said with a determined look.
“I happened to see women abused so many times, not only those who are cooks, but those who own their own dredge… they would go there with their husbands and they would abuse them verbally and physically.”
The cooks are sometimes abused by miners who are not happy with the food they cook and there is no one they can turn to.
Broomes and some other women have banded themselves together in an association with the hope of giving women a voice, who they say are exploited in the interior. Joining Broomes in this fight are Carol Elliot-Fredricks, vice-president; Donna Charles, treasurer; Candy Charles, secretary; and Anne Hopkinson, one of the committee members.
Since the association was formed late last month some seventy women have already joined, while many others have written letters of complaint hoping that the association would be able to assist. Broomes and other members would soon be meeting with the Minister of Natural Resources and Environment to raise several issues with him. A mining officer at Itaballi, who according to one female miner had her stripped searched and forcibly weighed her gold which was less in amount when returned, would come under scrutiny at that meeting.
Asked about the fact that many times women are exploited in the interior by their counterparts who sometimes forced them to become sex workers or at other time paid them minimal wages for services provided, Broomes responded they would be looking at all abuses.
“Whether the abuse is done by a man or by a woman, we would be addressing them and representing our womenfolk. It would not be a case of us ignoring abuse because it is done by a woman,” Broomes said.
They are hoping to get better health care for women in the interior as well as security, and they are also seeking to help prevent trafficking in persons.
‘So vulnerable’
Broomes said while men are also taken advantage of in the interior, women are “so vulnerable” and they bear the brunt of the wrongdoing being unable to help themselves in most cases.
“If you are in the interior and a man is abusing a woman it is not likely that someone would come to her assistance because for one, another woman if she step up she would fall in the same line and then another man once it is not his lady or anything he just not interested,” she told the Sunday Stabroek.
She said many women would also ignore any illness because there is seldom any health facility in the vicinity, and they sometimes are more concerned with making money to support their families back home than travelling for medical treatment which would be costly. She recalled passing a camp and seeing a woman who was obviously unwell, but was not keen on leaving the camp. However, with the intervention of her female boss she was taken to Bartica where she died.
“And you know why she passed away? Because her pressure was high, you understand? She as a woman was just fighting to feel better because there is nowhere you could go and test your pressure, and is seldom the health worker will come around to test for malaria.”
She said sometimes a woman would go as a cook in the interior and they would then be forced to become a sex worker.
“If a man want to sleep with you and in some cases some women refuse, that man would beat them bad; they have to do it, is like an obligation. And then some sex workers even if they have condoms as she believes in safe sex some men would tell them ‘I ain’t sexing with no condom you is a bad woman is bush you deh…’”
Transportation also is a problem for women as some are thrown into the “back of trucks like bags,” and as a woman in the field she could not sit and see women continue to be exploited and abused and not do anything.
She recalled her own experience when she and another woman miner were forced to walk for miles because the men on a tractor – the only means of transportation – refused to allow them to board.
“We meet to that junction to catch the tractor and it was loaded with these men so we run and flag it down and there was this guy from Ann‘s Grove who said, ‘This tractor nah carry whore, none whore nah travel yah,’” Broomes recalled.
She said they protested but the driver of the tractor refused to allow them to board as the man said “Whores does crass dem” and the other men agreed with his sentiment by their silence.
“So we had to do it by foot for two days…” Broomes related with a sad shake of her head.
And if a woman does not own a dredge in the interior and have your husband there is no respect given by the men. The association is hoping to remove the stigma associated with women working in the interior, as many people believe that they are all sex workers, although their position is that even if a woman is a sex worker she should be respected.
“You have to carry yourself in a certain manner and earn that respect from them, because if you don’t your husband would have to become involved because the men don’t respect you. The interior is a world by itself,” Broomes said.
The cooks in camp have no bathrooms, and the same way the men sometimes have to climb high to relieve themselves the woman is also forced to follow suit.
The association hopes to form sub-committees in all the regions so that women throughout the country in the industry will receive some form of representation.
“Mining is the largest industry in all the industries we have in Guyana… we three times bauxite, they don’t pay royalty and tax we do, we handing the GRA three billion in taxes, but yet it is so filthy,” Broomes said.
Broomes said women want to get into the interior not just to do mining but to drive heavy duty vehicles and other jobs because they are high-paying jobs.
“Women should not be scared because they are vulnerable,” she said.
The association said it is unfair for women to be ridiculed when they leave their children and go into the interior to work. For example, she said, a woman as a cook can earn as much as $150,000 per month, and if she has hungry children at home she can afford to pay someone to take care of them.
“They can make a sacrifice for six months and make money; it is the same way women leave their children and go to Barbados or America to work.”
There are also women in the interior who have children that do not attend school and this is another issue the association hopes to address.
Broomes has been a miner for some twenty-six years and told the Sunday Stabroek that she actually grew up in the industry, since her parents were into mining. The Bartician said that as a child she looked forward to spending time in the interior and it was there she learnt to drive outboard engines and trucks. She is married with three children – one has his own business and the two youngest attend School of the Nations. She recalled that when her business was young she was forced to leave her children at times in the interest of the business.
“Sometimes my belly so big it bracing the steering wheel when I driving, but I had to do it,” the woman recalled.
The association has an office at Lot 6 Alexander Street, Kitty and is in the process of securing a telephone line, but in the interim persons can contact Broomes at 645-2979.
