Vanessa Wilson-Johnson, the head teacher of the Mahdia Secondary School, is pleading for renovations to the “unlivable” quarters she was assigned to stay at for the duration of her contract.
“I almost burst into tears when I arrived here. I was taken to a house and felt I was in a rat hole. In the advertisement for the post, it said a house would be provided but what they didn’t say was a broken and dilapidated one,” Wilson-Johnson told Stabroek News yesterday. “Wood ants eat out the wood. The utensils… it was if I was back in time. The bed was eaten by wood ants, the steps gone, the paint peeled …no stove, the house was a shell… it was a disaster,” she added.
Wilson’s plight was highlighted during a community meeting attended by a visiting delegation from the AFC, which heard from her on the deplorable state of the government accommodation that was provided.
Wilson-Johnson said that so dilapidated and rodent and termite-infested was the house that she was forced to seek shelter under the stairs of the community guesthouse, after her paid time at the guesthouse had expired. There, she sleeps on a sofa and resides when not at school.
She explained that whenever there are guests in the hotel’s foyer, she cannot change her clothes or sleep and she gets no privacy. “All my business there for everyone to see but I stay because it is clean and I have peace of mind in that little corner. It is better than the place they gave because even in the yard it is bushy and who knows what lives there,” she said, adding that she is not even allowed to cook as she is not a paying guest at the establishment. However, kindhearted members of the community have been allowing her to share their kitchen whenever she has need to prepare a meal.
The head teacher said that according to Ministry of Education protocol, she had written to the Minister of Education through her District Education Officer, the Regional Education Officer and the Regional Executive Officer. To date, she said, she has not received correspondence from any of the parties although nearly every day she sees the REO.
When contacted by this newspaper, Education Minister Priya Manickchand said that she had not received a letter from Wilson. Harsawack, when told of the head teacher’s complaint, would not comment but said that he had not read yesterday’s edition of the newspaper and should be called at “around 4:30 when papers are normally delivered” to him. Stabroek News tried at 4:30 pm and 5 pm and after the latter call was instructed to call after 15 minutes. After that time elapsed, all further calls to the REO went unanswered up to press time.
Minister of Local Government Ganga Persaud stated that he was not aware of the case and referred this newspaper to Permanent Secretary Colin Croal instead. Croal said that he had read of the teacher’s issue in the newspaper and through his “internal mechanism” equipped himself with needed information. He said he was compiling an official statement which will be made today.
Wilson said since her appointment from September she has been “crying daily” but
musters the courage to perform her duties because of her love for the teaching profession. “Nobody is paying me any mind… I can’t live in this strange place like this for much longer. I am a woman, which makes it harder, but I don’t want to leave. I love the children… I don’t want a castle, I just want a clean place where I can be comfortable,” she said.
