The thought of becoming a Toshao never once crossed the mind of 19-year-old Jason Caitan so when he was nominated to be a candidate, he was both surprised and intimidated by the prospects of taking on such a huge role. However, buoyed by the encouragement of his family and friends, Caitan, who ended up winning a very close race, now believes he can develop his community.
Caitan was elected Toshao of Shea, an Indigenous community in the Deep South Rupununi, earlier this month. He is the youngest member to ever sit on the Shea Village Council.
During an interview with the Sunday Stabroek, the newly-elected Toshao revealed that he was quite surprised when he was nominated to be the Toshao of his community as not once during his childhood or teenage years did he ever think about becoming a prominent member of the community.
Caitan was born and spent most of his childhood in Shea. He left the community when he was 11 to further his education at the Aishalton Secondary School. After completing his education, he found employment through the Sustainable Wildlife Management (SWM) programme, which seeks to ensure that the Rupununi region can continue to offer sustainable options for food security and livelihoods in accordance with traditional lifestyles, while maintaining healthy fish and terrestrial wildlife populations at the landscape level.
He later returned to Shea and became a Community Service Officer (CSO).
After being nominated as a candidate for Toshao, Caitan said he expressed fear to his relatives and friends that he might be unfit for the challenge but they in turn expressed their faith in him and this encouraged him to give his opponent a run for the office.
Even then the race itself was not as easy as he hoped and he was faced with numerous of challenges from members of the community, with a key concern being that he was too young to be a Toshao. His age, he said, made many persons skeptical as they thought he was not exposed enough to lead the community. According to Caitan, some even went as far as to scandalise his name but this made him even more determined and he began aggressively campaigning to win over the people.
“It was very hard for me,” he recalled.
In the end, Caitan was elected the Toshao, winning the very tight race by only seven votes. “I couldn’t believe it but I am very happy that I won because everyone thought I was going to lose,” he said.
Cognisant that at least half of the villagers are skeptical about his leadership skills, Caitan said he aims to develop his community during what he hopes will not be his first and last term as a Toshao. He said, he is aware that Shea has tremendous tourism potential and while it is a long-term goal, it will be one of his main priorities as he hopes to get money circulating in the village as soon as possible.
Added to that, he said he hopes that their indigenous culture will be among the key attractions but sadly, this is being forgotten as many are adopting a more modern lifestyle. To preserve their culture, Caitan plans to form a youth group and a men’s group. “People are losing our culture, so I plan to make sure that they get back some of these skills because I think it is very important to preserve our culture. Not many youths can speak our Wapichan language, so I plan to change that with these groups,” he said, while lamenting that some who know how to speak the language are afraid to do so.
Caitan says he also wants to build a benab for cultural activities, which will also be tied to his tourism plans. However, with the COVID-19 pandemic still raging, he says his main goal is to keep his community safe and they will be rebuilding the gates at the entrance of the community to monitor the people who are traversing the area.
Thus far, he said Shea is yet to record a single COVID-19 case but it seems persons are becoming lax with the measures. Nevertheless, he was proud to report that a majority of the community’s population has received a first shot of a COVID-19 vaccine and is eager to receive the second. This achievement did not come easily, he said, as like in many other indigenous communities there was some amount of misinformation being spread about the vaccines. He credited sensitisation campaigns with helping to dispel the falsehoods, resulting in many going to get vaccinated.
The Toshao revealed that he, too, has received his first shot of a COVID-19 vaccine.
Other immediate plans by Caitan include helping pensioners with their farms and rebuilding the village ranch.