Dear Editor,
Post-independence Guyana endured many years of economic challenges and Guyanese were largely in survival mode, trying to meet the daily basic needs. This condition applied to the state, shouldered with limited budgets to meet the cost for provision of health care, education and the many social services. It can be reasonably assumed that maintenance and safety in buildings were never priorities in the planning and expenditure of the limited available finances. Over this extended time, the culture of neglect and indifference to safety in buildings, became the norm in Guyana, even as the economic fortunes of the country has improved significantly. Recent tragic fires, notably the Mahdia Dormitory incident, are the consequence of a culture of complacency and apathy toward health and safety in buildings that permeates Guyanese culture and has been imbued into the national psyche.
The Mahdia Incident will scar our collective memory forever whose effects prolong guilt and grieve. The site should be transformed to a memorial garden and the date be a time for reflection on our failures. The level of complacency and disregard for safety in buildings are on display everywhere, and can found in many public buildings, offices, supermarkets and stores on city streets and across the country and even in our own homes. The ardent search for culpability for the recent fires is not the solution to a nation-wide problem, as the laxity of HSE proliferates in private and public facilities across the country. The presence of a few fire extinguishers in a building does not constitute adequate fire protection for the occupants and physical assets. Fire safety commences with a design effort that are inclusive of an assessment of the fire load of the building and its contents, early detection with alarms, physical fire safety provisions [appropriate exits, corridor widths, emergency lighting and alarm etc.], training and periodical maintenance.
While enquiry into the tragic Mahdia Fire, will bring some measure of closure to the grieving families and communities, the ultimate response should not be reactive and instinctive – but a measured defined solution to a national deficiency as it relates to safety in buildings that ubiquitous across the country. The focus on the details may result in a lost opportunity to stimulate change at a national level. The State can initiate the process with appropriate education materials, updated standards and codes, removal of tariffs on safety related items, subsidies, incentives for compliances, training and enforcement. The State should lead by example and effect appropriate laws and upgrade all state operated facilities. A shift of mindset is required, to reframe the way we think about the value and importance of safety to those given for our care and ourselves.
Sincerely,
Deen Kamaludeen
