A teacher for 24 years, new A Partnership for National Unity (APNU) parliamentarian John Adams, hopes that by the end of the next five years teachers and students of the Vreed-en-Hoop Secondary School will no longer have to be away from school for about four days every time there is a high tide.
“Every time there is a high tide the school is inundated, and at this very moment we are out of school because yesterday [May 7] when we turned up for work the compound was flooded and the school is situated adjacent to an… active cemetery, so we know the health risk that can happen there so we had to shut the school,” Adams told the Sunday Stabroek.
Unfortunately for the children who are writing CSEC they were forced to sit their exams at the Leonora and the West Demerara secondary schools.
Before the school building is re-opened it has to be fumigated, and this process takes about four days.
Adams suggested that the school be relocated, or engineering skills have to be brought on board. He explained that the ‘Plastic City’ community is located just behind the school, and there is a gaping crack in the seawall, so whenever the tides come up the water passes through it and flows into the school compound. He feels that the fissure in the seawall actually alleviates the problem for the people in Plastic City, as the water is no longer locked in there, but flows through the crack into the school compound giving the residents some relief.
He said the issue cannot be fixed at the level of the Regional Democratic Council but rather the Ministry of Public Works would have to intervene, and while personnel from that ministry had come to check several times, nothing has been done to rectify the problem.
He said the entire Vreed-en-Hoop area is flooded at times, and as such it is for the ministry to have something done or for the school to be moved. And it is not just the teachers and students of the school who are affected, but also the in-service trainee teachers who have their classes in the school building and who have to use the Vreed-en-Hoop Primary School whenever there is a flood.
Adams hopes that the Ministry of Education will allocate a special building for the in-service trainee teachers, as they need to be comfortable when being taught. He suggested that the Windsor Forest Primary School old building which is not in use should be refurbished and used as the trainee teachers’ permanent base.
Meanwhile, Adams criticized the Ministry of Youth Sport and Culture for allowing the youth camp site at Dem Amstel to deteriorate to a point where it no longer can be used. He said that there were three camp sites in the country – the other two were at Madewini and Mainstay – and the one at Madewini is still being maintained by the ministry. He said he hopes that the ministry fixes the site so that the young people in Region Three can have some access to a recreational facility. He said in years gone by every weekend campers from all over the country used the facility and during the August vacation it was always filled.
He commended the government for establishing a technical institute in the region and pointed out that it cannot be said that no development had taken place under the PPP/C there, as there had been some. But he called for something else for young women, since 98% of those who attend the technical institute are males and he suggested there should be an annex of Carnegie in the region. And if the camp site is refurbished it could be used to have classes of some sort for young women too.
He said he is expected to meet with Minister of Youth Sport and Culture Dr Frank Anthony and the Minister of Local Government Ganga Persaud to discuss the way forward for the camp site.
“Region Three, because of its make-up, tends to get a little more attention from government, but it is not equally spread, so I hope that whatever is the portion of cake to be shared that everybody must get a piece, and while we cannot say in some areas no work is being done… work is being done on a minimal [scale],” Adams said.
And even though he is a regional member of parliament and represents mainly Region Three, Adams said he is also on the team with former Commissioner of Police Winston Felix looking at security.
The new parliamentarian said the opposition is not in parliament to oppose for opposing‘s sake, but the members are making sure that whatever is there to be shared is done equitably.
“Our role in parliament should not be confrontational, but there must be a consensus,” Adams said, adding that this is what the opposition was aiming for during talks before the budget cuts, but that the talks broke down.
He said both government and opposition must work together as a team for the benefit of the people of Guyana. “But the government would have found themselves in total control for nineteen years, so they are in a transitional period, and I think sooner or later they would get to understand that we have got to work hand in glove with these people and then everything is going to go well,” an optimistic Adams said.
He added that whatever the opposition was asking for in the budget was not just for the benefit of their supporters, but for the benefit of all Guyanese, and the government needed to take at least some of what the opposition suggests on board.
Adams is not new to politics as has been a member of the PNCR for a number of years. He joined the party’s youth arm in 1985 and held many offices at the regional and national level, before moving on to the main party after he came of age. He was on the Regional Democratic Council (RDC) for 19 years before being appointed a parliamentarian.
“So politics is not new to me and the working of the National Assembly is not at all new, because at the regional level it is our local parliament and at that place you have to represent the people’s interest and your constituents and all of that,” he told the Sunday Stabroek.
At present he is the head of the language department at the Vreed-en-Hoop Secondary School.
He was born and bred in Dem Amstel where he still lives today, and is the father of two daughters.
