Sunday, September 13th, 2020 Parade Ground George-town was the first scene of another display of weeping and mourning that would continue along the East Coast of Demerara and culminate in Berbice. The tears of the oppressed and those who think themselves powerless continue to be disregarded, while many of the authors of the destruction remain unscathed. While the peoples’ energies are consumed by never-ending cries for equal rights, peace and justice, a minority continues to dominate this world.
While we protest, they plan.
While we weep through the night, with joy never arriving in the morning, they watch until the anger subsides, and nothing changes except that they maintain the power.
We have seen glimpses of a global revolution. But the global revolution when we, the people, will reclaim this Earth to ensure that there is truth, order, balance, peace, reciprocity and justice for all, has not yet been televised.
Already here, do you hear the silence that has begun to drown out the cries about the deaths of Joel, Isaiah and Haresh? Has anyone been charged? Are there plans to charge anyone?
When the people continue to whisper and the rumours abound, it will only be a while before the fury erupts again.
I faced the threat of an anxiety attack as I approached Parade Ground, where the heads of enslaved Africans were displayed after they were beheaded following the Demerara Slave Rebellion which took place in August 1823. The spirits of Joel and Isaiah must have been standing with the spirts of those other restless ones.
Black, white and red are colours I have seen far too often as the murdered lay in coffins. Cautious because of COVID-19, I stood quietly away from the crowd and occasionally greeted acquaintances. It was a feeling of déjà vu.
I was in that space again; the darkness threatening my peace as the memories of slain villagers, activists and relatives returned. I had stood with the same emotions on every such occasion. Helplessness, hopelessness, anger, anxiety and fear. Still I thought, we are singing songs to suppress the pain as our ancestors did on those plantations and though our songs may not bring justice or peace, they calm and keep many of us sane.
The same story is still being written. But how long will lines and paragraphs and chapters be added? How many editions of this book must be written?
The messages of peace and calls for justice have been added to this chapter of Joel and Isaiah. The cheers when something was said that moved the crowd and the outrage as little groups stood recounting what had occurred and voicing their thoughts about who they believed were guilty all played before me.
These lines about viewing the remains of our children have been written too often. I do not view the remains of the dead once it can be avoided. I prefer to remember people as they were alive. In childhood, cadavers manifested in nightmares. In young adulthood, I was so disturbed by the last corpse I chose to watch that I decided to desist from the practice. But the procession to watch lifeless bodies are part of the story in these ongoing chapters.
A few local artistes released a song this week. Saiku, Timeka Marshall and Samuel Medas released ‘Change the Story’. A song that speaks about changing the story of hate and replacing it with one of love.
Much of what is already written of our story cannot be changed. While the sun dies at dusk each day and resurrects at dawn, man dies but our physical bodies, are not resurrected. There is hope for the believers in reincarnation and those who believe in the coming of a saviour who will raise all from the dead.
Those who participated in murdering their brothers and sisters in this land cannot reverse their actions; there is no undoing every emotion of hate, pain, hopelessness and fear that was ever felt; everything that has been destroyed, every innocent person that has suffered because of the miscreants, none of it, can be undone.
So how do we change this Guyana story? The recommendations for peace and justice that have been written in chapter after chapter obviously have not worked. Unfortunately, if we do not see justice for our murdered children this time, the chapters about how to get away with murder will continue to be written in this book. These emboldened monsters will continue to walk among us, feeling invincible and someone else’s child being harmed is a real possibility. The possibility of any of us being victims is also real. The possibility of vigilante justice is also real.
The only way this story will change is if we see that justice in this country is not for a few. That justice has no price that can deny it, no social class, political affiliation or ethnicity.
But as long as the offenders can pay their way out or use their influence to escape prosecution, what is justice in Guyana? As long as we the people are outraged for a few days before becoming engrossed in something else, what is justice in Guyana?
The only way this story will change is if we are honest. Honest about the hate that exists here. Honest about the history that has brought us here. Honest about those who will not change.
The story will change if the children are raised with a clean slate where they are not fed the same poison of hate. The story will change when we the people do not tire after only a short time.
Alone in my little space after I returned home from Parade Ground, I felt the urge to sink into a corner and weep. But instead, I sat in silence staring at the walls for a while. Then I stood under the shower for a while hoping the water would wash the despair away.
I did not know Joel and Isaiah. Most of us who have joined with their relatives and friends in mourning them did not know them. We were not only crying for them. We were crying about the past. We were crying about the present. And we were crying because we could see these chapters being written over and over again in our future.
Please do not let the deaths of Joel, Isaiah and Haresh go unresolved. What kind of society is this if children can be murdered with such brutality and there are no one answers, and no one is held accountable?
We saw the mutilated bodies of the Henrys and it is one of the most barbaric crimes we have ever seen in Guyana. Please do not let those who did this to walk free to do it again.
I am hopeful because I have seen that the accused in the other recent Berbice murders have been charged. Those accused of murdering Orlando Jonas, who was stabbed to death, have been charged. Those accused of killing Prettipaul Hargobin who was beaten at Bath Settlement during protests have been charged. What about the killers of Joel, Isaiah and Haresh?
