Dear Editor,
We are residents of Kaikan Village and we wish to bring to your attention the fact that we are indignant about the article written in Stabroek News dated Wednesday, January 6 , 2016, captioned ‘Gov’t team visits Kaikan… in backdrop of border tensions with Venezuela.’ The report misleads the citizens of our country and the whole world in relation to the incident with the Venezuelan military helicopter which landed on the airstrip in our village on the 4th of December, 2015. The information about the incident is distorted, even though we recognize that it was GINA which was quoted.
This is how it was.
When the helicopter landed, some curious residents came out onto the airstrip to see what was happening. Among the crowd were two members of the Guyana Defence Force in civilian clothes. Recognizing the helicopter the soldiers ran back to their barracks. The helicopter was on the ground for less than ten minutes. The engine was still running when the pilot came out of the helicopter and called one of the women who was watching to ask if this village was San Juan on the Venezuela border. The pilot asked the question in Spanish and the woman told him that this village was Kaikan on the Guyana shore. Immediately the pilot went back into the helicopter and took off for San Juan and the residents went back home.
Nobody saw heavily armed soldiers and there was nothing intimidating about this incident until 25 minutes later, after the helicopter had taken off, the GDF soldiers based at Kaikan came out onto the airstrip armed with their weapons and started running all over the village. Villagers ran for shelter and were frightened. One of the soldiers stopped a female resident who was going home from a creek, pointing his weapon at her. She became frightened and begged him not to shoot her. She was horrified and intimidated. We find that the behaviour of the GDF soldiers was unprofessional and aggressive; some of the residents of Kaikan were accused of being Venezuelan nationals and were asked to produce their national identification cards and birth certificates. Such behaviour caused more problems between the soldiers and the community and once again raised the aversion of the residents to the presence of the military in Kaikan.
We also presented a letter about this incident to President David Granger and the relevant authorities, as well as the Chief of Staff on December 18, 2015. Hence the reason for the government visit to Kaikan.
We are therefore disappointed and alarmed that this has not been covered in the press in so far as we have continued to ask for the GDF barracks to be removed from within the community, and by extension from within the titled lands of Kaikan Village. We had been calling for this under the PPP/C administration, and now under the new government. We have had years of very unpleasant interaction with the soldiers of the Guyana Defence Force and have lost confidence in them, and hence the strong request not to have them in our community.
We must let our fellow Guyanese know that we have total allegiance to Guyana and will defend and support the sovereignty of Guyana. However, we are also aware that it does not require the soldiers to be stationed in our community for them to be effective in the defence of our country. Therefore, once again, we would like everyone to know that we are not pleased with the coverage of the meeting and would like to see balanced and full coverage of the meeting.
Yours faithfully,
Claude Anselmo
Toshao
Kaikan Village
