This is the seventh entry in a series on the current state of civil society in Guyana.
After her 17-year-old daughter was killed by a drunk driver in 1996, Denise Dias began to look at road safety issues in Guyana and found there were no laws to cover the use of seat belts and breathalysers. Dias, who went on to found the Alicea Foundation and Mothers in Black, does not use the term ‘road accident’ for someone who dies by speeding or drunken driving. “Road safety is no accident. If you knock down somebody, that is not an accident. That is a crash. You don’t even hear the amount of crashes now. Even if the police say it is eight or ten a month it is double that,” she said.
At the time she didn’t realise that there weren’t many traffic laws in place to deal with errant drivers. “In the case of Alicea, we only had one court hearing because the young person who killed my daughter left the country illegally.”
Within months of Alicea’s death, she said other mothers contacted her. A good friend of hers, the late Andaiye, told her about some Peruvian women, whose daughters were missing and who used to protest in the Peruvian Square with pictures of their missing daughters. A few days after listening to Andaiye, Dias decided to do a similar activity with the mothers who contacted her.
“We called ourselves Mothers in Black and we went opposite the Parliament Buildings and stood there with our loved ones’ photographs. Because I was not vocal at that time, we decided just to stand there as a silent protest and just do one hour every Friday. We did this for nearly four years.”
According to Dias, civil society and non-governmental organisations bring awareness to the wider society and the powers-that-be about things they feel are not going right and give voice to the concerns of a constituency that is not political.
“Most of us who are in civil society organisations are not politicians. We do not wish to be politicians. We don’t wish to slaughter anyone. If we can show someone who can listen to our concerns and they do something about that, assist us. There are wonderful volunteers throughout Guyana. If they can add their voices to what they feel is going wrong, without the powers-that-be thinking that they are being too heavily criticised and try to do something about it then we’re making a step forward.”
Mothers in Black is not a registered entity. According to Dias, it was leap-frogged from the Alicea Foundation, which she founded shortly after Alicea was killed. In the beginning it was funded by the funds from her daughter’s life insurance policy.
Initially Dias helped people go to court and supported members of the public who were grieving like her. “I was happy about that because it covered so many grieving mothers from all walks of life. They heard my voice and they added their voices to mine. We just had to do something.”
From the silent protests outside the Parliament, Mothers in Black obtained signatures calling for traffic violations legislation. “We got more and more people to join and support us. We had candle lights vigils, ‘drive with care’ posters. We did our best to focus on road safety. Eventually the powers-that-be legislated on seat belts, wearing helmets and introducing the breathalysers and the speedometers.”
However with laws in place, Dias said, “There is no enforcement. Mothers in Black can’t enforce the law. We can only make people aware of what is going on. We have gone through endless Commissioners of Police since 1996. It’s the usual thing, Road safety has never been a priority when it should be.”
Since then whenever there were road issues, Dias became the voice on road safety issues.
“I have been pretty dormant with road safety issues not being as expressive as I used to be mainly because of age. I really wanted other people to continue to support the work in some way. Like most things, it just petered out unfortunately.”
However, the issue hit close to home again recently for Dias when her son Deje lost his best friend, Ian Mekdeci, 28, to another drunken driver and the memories of how Alicea died came flooding back. Mekdeci was to be Deje’s best man at his wedding later in the year. Instead Deje will have no best man but an empty chair for where Mekdeci should have been and another for his sister Alicea.
“Ian did all the right things. He was out partying with his friends. He had a designated driver and then ‘boops’ the inevitable happened. The young drunken driver killed him,” Dias emphasised
“This time a breathalyser was used and he was above the legal limit. I got angry again and I sent a note out to friends and family about doing something again. Since then I have been asked what is Mothers in Black doing in view of the drinking, driving and speeding taking place on the roads. It is wrong and it goes back to those in position to do something about it. Not this old woman here who is 70 plus.”
Nevertheless, she said, “I want to rally the crowd again. Maybe this will be my last stance but I hope that it will be an issue that others will take over and do something about it. We are launching a vigil soon. We’re hoping to get together lots of young people, my old faithful Mothers in Black and my old faithful supporters. It won’t be like before with placards but I will arrange to have the candles and it will just be for one night. It will target mainly young people about what we can do now to stop the carnage on the roads. We are killing too many young people. The decision makers have to do something and be made aware of what is going on. It doesn’t matter what religion you are or the colour of your skin. We are all affected and we have to put an end to it. A young child was killed up to the other day. People are speeding and they are getting away with it. The court system is wrong and this is where I have been riled up again.”
Noting that Mekdeci was killed in the same spot as businessman Colin Ming and former minister in the ministry of education Desiree Fox-Caesar, Dias questioned, “Why aren’t we doing something about it? It is obvious that something is wrong at that corner. Up on the East Coast Demerara in the Mahaica area, there have been several crashes yards apart. There has to be a reason. Is it the way our roads are built? If we had a proper data system in place, red flags will go up. In 1996 we hadn’t the technology we now have in place to show up immediately on the computers of the police commissioner, the minister and the President.”
She noted, too, that the country continues to import cars “like crazy” without building proper roads. “We don’t we finish building our roads, highways and flyovers then bring in the cars?” she says. “We shouldn’t be making these steps backwards because all I am saying today goes back to 1996 and the same things are still happening and it has gotten worse.”
Help and Shelter
Dias is also a co-founder of Help and Shelter along with attorney Josephine Whitehead. Today, Whitehead is the chairman of the board of directors while Dias is the vice chairman. With the exception of staff members who are on the board, all other board members are volunteers. Help and Shelter had its genesis in the reopening of Legal Aid in 1995 by Whitehead. According to Dias, when she finished her work she used to go over to Legal Aid to help in filing or act as a receptionist or help in other mundane activities.
“Most of the time it was to direct clients who to see based on their reasons for coming to Legal Aid. There was this endless line of women seeking divorces because they were in abusive relationships and they did not know what to do and where to get help. What they really needed was a place like a shelter for abused women.”
Dias and Whitehead engaged the then housing minister, Dr Henry Jeffrey, who assisted them in obtaining land to build a shelter with the help of the Canadian High Commission. The shelter and a crisis centre are still functioning.
The NGO provides shelter for six months but Dias said, “We have had clients who stayed for a year or even more because of their situation. We counsel and we do our best, especially with women who had never been able to earn an income. We guide them to get jobs so they can leave an abusive relationship, start a new life and thrive. There are some who go back to the same abuser.”
Most of the challenges had to do with funding. “We have staff. We have programmes. We don’t charge anything. The Canadians, Americans, British, other diplomatic missions including the UN agencies have helped us. We get a stipend from government but of course that is not enough. We have managed to limp along. We provide free housing, free counselling, free food. If they want to go to learn to cook, we expend our money there. They want to know how to manicure, to do make up all sorts of things, even to become farmers, we do our best to assist in every way.”
Help and Shelter’s financial records are good and Dias thinks it is one of the reasons why the NGO receives a substantial stipend from government.
“We have to pay staff. We have to transport clients, feed and clothe them. The stipend is not enough because more people are aware of what we do. To get qualified and experience people we need the extra money. We are very grateful that the government has at long last recognised us over the past ten years or so. Before that we really struggled.”
Coming out of the work of Help and Shelter, Dias said there has been several laws with regards to children and abused women but these she said would not have been possible without networking with other civil society organisations and NGOs, such as the Women Lawyers’ Association and Red Thread. “We are all in this together. We have a few men who have come forward to say they need help. It is a Caribbean thing that very few men will say they were abused.”
