Parents of two of the survivors of the May 21st 2023 Mahdia Secondary School dorm fire have moved to the court seeking in excess of $10 million from the state for injuries suffered by their children.
Through their lawyers Eusi Anderson and Renea Marcus the parents of the two children have filed separate matters asking for the sum for negligence by the State of Guyana and its diverse agencies.
Twenty children died in the tragedy.
The parents of the children have named Attorney General Anil Nandlall SC as the defendant in the matters. While the matter was filed on October 10th 2023 Stabroek News understands that the document was only served yesterday.
One parent deposed that the fire caused her daughter to suffer smoke inhalation and severe trauma. She also witnessed the death of 20 of her peers including two relatives.
She said since the fire her daughter has struggled to sleep, communicate and engage with her peers as she did prior to the incident.
In their separate filings the two parents say that their children were “…at all material times a ward of the State at the time of the fire being exclusively in the care and custody of the Mahdia Secondary School Dormitory, Mahdia, Potaro-Siparuni on 21st May 2023. This wardship affixed the Defendant State entity responsible for management of the Mahdia Secondary School Dormitory with a duty of care to ensure her welfare and keep her in a peril free environment”.
Both of the parents said their daughters have reported “…profound and unbearable trauma and mental distress upon reflection of the death of her peers and the narrow escape (they) made before the fire engulfed her school dorm”.
One of the girls suffered serve burns to her shoulder, face and both hands, in some instances multiple degrees and requiring extensive hospitalisation. She has permanent damage to her eyes from fire burns and permanent partial loss of sight.
Listing the particulars of the negligence both parents said that the State failed to equip the school’s dormitory and its staff with the necessary skills, experience and expertise in the management of an emergency scenario including but not limited to a fire.
They also made mention of the lack of illumination to direct the occupants to escape routes in the event of an emergency, failure to keep the emergency exits clear and operation and failure to keep and maintain fire extinguishers on the premises of the dormitory.
The two parents also in their statement pointed out the failure to abide by the Guyana Fire Service at Mahdia’s recommendations of February 2023 and November 2022 urging the immediate removal of the grills from the windows of the dormitory. There was also the failure to have the correct ratio of teacher to student at the school and to keep the internal materials, fixtures, beddings and other movables of appropriate material to mitigate the risk and damage of fire.
In the days after the fire, it became known that the Mahdia fire service, which the claims referred to, had twice made recommendations for the metal security grills on the dorm to be removed, but to no avail. It was also later disclosed that a report commissioned by the Ministry of Education to assess the dorms had found that fire safety measures were absent at the Mahdia Secondary School girls’ dorm. That report was available in May, 2022.
