Dear Editor,
The recent inferno at Christ Church Secondary School has reignited concerns about the vulnerability of our school buildings to the consuming wrath of Guyana’s destructive conflagrations. Generations of students are questioning what really happened to their beloved alma mater, their iconic monument of excellence and achievement, now transitioned to be part of Guyana’s fiery history. Along with other important buildings, the ashes of physical structures, the intricate architectural designs; elaborate metallic or wooden fretwork, handsome wooden or metallic latticework, soaring cathedral-like ceilings and, of course, the signature Demerara shutters, have all perished, gone forever. The dark ghostlike embers of some buildings linger and languish for years as eyesores, where they once stood, majestically. With every school building, worthy of landmark status, that is burnt, Guyana’s built heritage is diminished and is replaced with barnlike structures that are devoid of any architectural interest that is aesthetically pleasing, and not fit for 21st century ‘smart’ learning. No wonder Georgetown struggles and may have already lost out, to attain the status of a UNESCO World Heritage Site, unlike its neighbouring counterpart city, Paramaribo, which attained this distinction in 2002. Guyana’s schools need to be protected, restored and preserved by The National Trust of Guyana.
This year 2023, marks 30 years since the West Demerara Secondary School was mysteriously burnt to the ground, sometime in 1993. The school was formerly housed in a classic Demerara style building named, Shamrock Manor, the stately residence of the late British Captain J.P. Coghlan at Klien, Pouderoyen, West Bank Demerara. Captain Coghlan was said to be an early proponent of building a bridge across the Demerara River. The West Demerara Secondary School was rebuilt in concrete on the same spot of Shamrock Manor.
• On the evening of November 16, 1997, the heart of Queen’s College, its main auditorium and administrative block, was razed to the ground by a mysterious fire. The structure that replaced it, approximately six years later in 2003, lacks its original aesthetics but QC rose from the ashes like a phoenix.
• On Christmas morning, December 25, 2004, Sacred Heart Primary School, along with the Sacred Heart Church on Main Street Georgetown, were completely destroyed by a raging inferno. The church was thankfully rebuilt. The school was never rebuilt.
• On September 4, 2013, at the beginning of the new school term, the heart of L’Adventure Secondary School, Canal No.1, West Bank Demerara, which housed the main auditorium and administrative block, was gutted by a mysterious early morning blaze. The school was thankfully rebuilt and has grown from strength to strength with the help of the community.
• On June 20, 2021, in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, a fire of mysterious origin gutted a main section of the North Ruimveldt Multilateral School, Georgetown, which housed the school’s $3 million ‘smart’ classroom, the first to be launched in Guyana in 2015 as well as the school’s First to Fifth-Form classrooms, Home Economics, Information Technology and Science laboratories. The school has not been rebuilt.
• On September 24, 2021, the Mabaruma Secondary School in Guyana’s North West District was destroyed by a mysterious fire. A contract was recently signed for the rebuilding of this school.
• On July 22, 2022, a fire of ‘unknown origin’ destroyed the St. George’s High School, Georgetown. This school was located a stone-throw away from Guyana’s world-famous St. Georges Cathedral. This school has not been rebuilt.
• On Thursday, January 12, 2023, just a few days after a small fire was extinguished in one of its laboratories, Christ Church Secondary School on Camp and Middle streets, Georgetown, whose eastern and western wings were built by self-help (by the students) in the 1960’s, was sadly destroyed by a mysterious fire. The Guyana Police Force is reportedly looking for a ‘mysterious arsonist.’
Editor, collectively, thousands of students, hundreds of teachers and staff have been displaced by these enigmatic ‘pyrotechnics.’ Except for one or two cases which were deemed as ‘electrical’ by the Guyana Fire Service, the majority of the cases were described by both mainstream and social media, as well as the GFS, as ‘fires of unknown origin’ or ‘arson’. As a graduate and alumnus of both Christ Church Secondary and Queen’s College, I, and many alumni who, similarly, share both ‘almae matres’, look forward to Christ Church Secondary, rising swiftly and magnificently from the ashes, like a phoenix, at its historic location at Camp and Middle streets Georgetown. It must not take six years to be rebuilt, as experienced by our beloved QC.
Yours sincerely,
Standhope Williams
