Dear Editor,
Unusual stories from the Guyana airport shouldn’t be seen as singular. The place is an embarrassment to national pride; anyone can see it. Shiv Chanderpaul revealed just a speck of what the general impression of the Guyana airport is to the average traveller, and implies the need to have a modern, larger, more efficient and tourism-friendly international airport.
Nationals of the USA, Canada and other world-class airports do not have to join any lines upon arrival at immigration. They go to one of many kiosks to let themselves into their homeland. Guyanese returning home have to endure long lines at their own airport ‒ lines that sometimes stretch outside the arrival terminal strip leading to the runway. Embarrassing!
There are not enough immigration officers and cubicles to tend to a passenger load that has just disembarked from a 220-seat aircraft; it’s totally ridiculous.
Then they are not properly train-ed; not a smile on their faces, these officers. It’s no surprise they grilled Shiv Chanderpaul, a national cricketer about his nationality.
The departure terminal is also an embarrassment. In other countries persons can accompany their families right up to the area where they walk in to go to immigration, but not so in Guyana. The terminal is so cramped, guards have to stand up outside to make sure only passport holders enter to check in.
Persons outside beg for a glimpse on the tinted glass on the outside to make sure their families are checking-in properly.
We have the resources and intelligence to do so much better in Guy-ana.
Yours faithfully,
Leon Suseran
