Just a day after apologising for abusing rights activist Sherlina Nageer, Health Minister Dr Bheri Ramsaran disparaged her at a meeting with Regional Health Officers (RHOs), telling them that she was a “miscreant” and in need of “psychiatric help”.
Ramsaran’s apology has been met with public outrage for blaming Nageer for provoking him and a new recording from his meeting with RHOs on Wednesday finds him lamenting that she could “spit in my face but not collect two slap.”
Since the first recording of the minister’s encounter with Nageer in front of the Whim Police Station, there have been calls for his resignation while President Donald Ramotar and the PPP continue to remain silent.
Members of a number of groups moved a protest to the Office of President, where they continued to call for Ramotar to sack the minister while condemning the statements he made on Monday. The protest action is to continue today in front of the minister’s Brickdam office for a second day.
Ramsaran is a senior member of the PPP and a candidate at the May 11th general elections for the incumbent PPP/C. Observers have pointed out that even though polls are just weeks away, the president has to demonstrate he takes violence against women seriously and in this instance it can only be done by firing Ramsaran.
Nageer yesterday said that she is heartened by the support women and men are showing and pointed out that she does not see it as support for her but rather for all women. “It is taking a stand against abuse of women in general, not really support for me,” she said.
During their encounter on Monday, Ramsaran said he would slap Nageer for the fun of it and have her stripped in a public place. Ramsaran could also be heard calling Nageer a “piece of shit” and an “idiot” and demanding that she get out of his face. She had confronted him about the deaths of women and children in the health care system under his watch.
Despite his subsequent comments on Wednesday, at no time during the confrontation between the two did Nageer spit in the minister’s face.
The new recording was made during a meeting with the RHOs at Plaza Hotel on Wednesday, less than a day after he issued his contentious apology.
“…We have these miscreants, who sometimes are supported by the international community because they are rights activists—right to come spit in my face but not collect two slap! You understand?” he is heard saying on the recording.
He adds that one of his ladies who love him could have “wreck her up,” since his name is “Bheri Best and all the ladies like me.”
“Suppose one of my big strong women seh, ‘Wuh yuh do we doctor? Wuh yuh do dis innocent lil man?’ Wacks! Wacks! …Then she’s going to become a hero. Some of us will mek sure we give her a medal,” he says.
“Right, spit in my face, I don’t know if she got rabies or what. I know she was rabid. That woman needs psychiatric help,” he adds.
According to reports none of the RHOs had asked him about Monday’s incident.
‘Crosses every
boundary of decency’
Meanwhile, women and youth groups of the APNU+AFC coalition have voiced their outrage at the minister’s verbal attack on Nageer on Monday, while saying that they cringed when they heard the threats he made.
“Ramsaran’s behaviour crosses every boundary of decency. He has once again demonstrated the crassness and total disrespect for this nation’s women which we are now convinced is an entrenched culture within the hollow halls of Freedom House,” the coalition said in a statement yesterday.
It added that the PPP/C is providing Guyanese with the reasons to remove it from the leadership of the country, while pointing out there have been other instances of abuse by party members against citizens.
Saying that the abuse must stop now, the coalition stated that there is no need for more evidence that the PPP has no respect for the people whom they should have been governing.
“We have grown tired of their constant spewing of racist rhetoric and their indulgence in hate mongering. The PPP/C is a stain on Guyana’s international image,” the statement added.
So far, the PPP/C’s Prime Ministerial candidate Elisabeth Harper has condemned the minister’s abusive utterances. “I condemn his utterances in the strongest possible manner. It is yet another example of how much more needs to be done in ensuring that women are treated with respect and dignity especially by the exemplars of our society,” Harper said in a statement on Wednesday issued through the Government Information Agency (GINA).
“This incident is not an isolated case; it is symptomatic of the way our society can still be at times despite the huge strides we have made in advancing the rights of women,” she continued. However, she stopped short of calling for his resignation or any other sanction against him.
And when asked about the issue on Wednesday, former president Bharrat Jagdeo told a news conference at Freedom House: “Personally, I think it should have never happened. It was distasteful and we should never say anything about anyone, particularly women, in that way.”
Jagdeo’s ex-wife, Varshnie Singh, has publicly said that she suffered “high-tech domestic violence” and had detailed how she was emotionally, financially and psychologically abused by her former husband.
The confrontation between Nageer and Ramsaran occurred while he was speaking to two reporters. She interjected when he called Christopher Ram a “wife beater” and asked if Jagdeo did not have issues with his wife as well, at which point the minister asked who she was. Nageer also questioned why he was there when he was the Minister of Health and women and children were dying under his watch.
