A former Berbice journalist who came from humble beginnings, and was raised to believe that a woman’s sole purpose is to be a housewife, has defeated the odds and was sworn in as an attorney-at-law last month.
It was a proud moment for Moonmattie Devi Seitaram, 32, when Justice Simone Morris-Ramlall of the Supreme Court in Georgetown admitted her to the Bar.
Her petition was presented by her mentor and best friend, Tuanna Hardy, who is also a Berbician.
“Becoming an attorney is an important achievement, not only for myself, but my family. I’m the first girl in my family to become a lawyer, something my late father would have been extremely proud of,” Seitaram said.
“I am from very humble beginnings and despite spending my early years selling in the market in Berbice, my parents always prioritised my schooling.”
She pointed out too: “I was raised in a village where it was thought that women only had one purpose; to be a housewife. An educated woman was not considered virtuous.”
Her childhood days at Edinburgh, East Bank Berbice, were filled with struggles, but it did not prevent her from excelling when she completed high school.
She hopes that her achievement can motivate young girls, especially from her village, to follow their dreams.
At the age of 17 she had enrolled at the University of Guyana, Tain Campus to pursue a diploma in Public Relations. Unfortunately she had to drop out because her parents could not afford to pay the fees.
She then starting working at the Little Rock Television (LRTV) station in New Amsterdam as a journalist.
She developed a love for reading after seeing, her father, Khemraj Seitaram, who did not have much education, reading a lot. Reading also sparked her desire of wanting to be a journalist.
She felt frustrated as a journalist in Guyana and Jamaica though, because writing was not able to bring about change for the people as she had hoped.
That gave her the drive to one day become a legislator. “I felt I had more to give and wanted to make an impact in society,” she said.
She also developed a love for law while covering court stories in Berbice and being impressed with the way the lawyers conducted themselves.
She noted too, “Because I covered the court, people used to come to me for help,” she recalled. She would approach the lawyers on their behalf and singled out Charrandass Persaud as being one who never refused to help.
Working at LRTV provided her with the exposure and opportunity needed to go off into the professional world.
Three years later she left LRTV to work in Georgetown at the Guyana Times newspaper as a reporter and was sent on a training workshop in Miami. That trip led her to the path she has now paved her future from.
It all started when she met a group of Jamaican journalists there and was impressed by the way they spoke and the quality of work that they produced.
She inquired where they had studied and learnt that it was at the Caribbean Institute of Media and Communications (Carimac), University of the West Indies (UWI) in Jamaica. She chose to study there as well, since it offered the only recognised journalist programme.
She completed her diploma programme in Media and Communications, but could not find any job when she returned home. Her next move was going back to Jamaica and enrol for a journalism degree programme.
No easy road!
But it was no easy road! She faced serious financial difficulties and was not able to visit her parents and siblings back home.
When her father died in 2013 she had to make a tough decision to leave off her studies to attend his funeral.
Her fears were that if she failed to complete her course she would have to repay the partial scholarship fund she had earned.
In 2015 she graduated with a degree in journalism. The following year, she applied to UWI to read for her masters programme. On that application, she had to list a second option for her studies and she chose law.
As it turned out, she got accepted to study law in July of 2017 and decided to go for it. In December of the same year, she had already completed one semester when she finally got accepted for her masters in journalism.
She initially signed up for the three-year programme in law, at a cost of US$10,000 per year. She chose an option to complete the course in two years, even though it was “nerve-wrecking” and financially challenging to come up with the school fees.
The hardest part was having to quit her job as the administrative assistant to the Jamaican Tourism Minister. She had also managed his executive office.
That job required her to travel locally and abroad and it meant missing her law studies, which were very technical and intense, if she remained in it.
She requested a day job that allowed her to work remotely. She also served as the social media manager for Visit Jamaica, with the Jamaica Tourist Board, for four years.
Before her law studies started, she offered public relations (PR) services and was on the verge of starting her own company.
She closed off her PR contracts because she no longer had the time to focus on the clients’ needs and did not want to damage her reputation by not providing the level of work that clients were accustomed to.
The programme was very tough and she became anxious each day thinking that she was not going to make it. Now that it is finally over, she feels relieved that she can enjoy life as a normal person.
Without wanting to sound selfish, she said the novel coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic turned out to be a blessing in disguise for her.
She was in her second year of studies when it hit and more than ever, she welcomed the convenience of online learning and working from home.
Seitaram is preparing to get called to the bar in Jamaica. Among her plans for the future is establishing an office in Guyana so as to lend her “skills and services here.”
She still wants more out of life and sees herself undertaking the journey of becoming a judge. Getting married and having children are also part of her plans, and she wants to “have the time to be present and be an active figure in their lives.”
She thanked her “mother, Lilowtie Seitaram and my late father, Khemraj Seitaram for going against the grains and ensuring that I understood the importance of education,” her brothers, Avinash, Vijay, Vidan and Joel, as well as her “sisters-in-law, Leelawattie and Vaanita for making up when I missed my duties as a daughter.”
She also expressed gratitude to her lecturers, friends and family in Guyana and Jamaica, including Minister Ed Bartlett and scholarship organiser, Beverly Hunter, for their support.
