It is conceivable that it would not have occurred to many Guyanese residing on ‘the coastal plain’ that both children and teachers in parts of the hinterland must endure the safety and health hazards as well as the indignity that attends the need to use pit latrines outside of schools’ and, seemingly, that there appears not to exist, up to this time, any immediate-term plan to remove this unacceptable obstacle to the delivery of education in a convivial environment in those areas. Here, and even as there may well occur a further vigorous and wider verbal discourse over this disturbing disclosure, the immediate priority must be to have these health and safety hazards removed over as brief a period as possible, beginning immediately, and replaced by flush toilets.
It is apposite to wonder whether the announcement in August by Education Minister, Priya Manickchand, that government is in the process of ‘transitioning’ pit latrines to flush toilets in hinterland areas will be accelerated now that the issue has been placed prominently in the public domain.
Incidentally, the outbreak of a political ‘blame game’ is an altogether inappropriate response to this disclosure. Hinterland development – which includes the installation of sanitation requisites – ought to have been occurring incrementally, over time, so that by now there ought to have been some evidence of an upgrade in areas of hygiene and sanitation. On the other hand, it can be argued that by now, the availability of petro dollars would have allowed for much more expeditious expenditure on requisites associated with the safety and health of children (and their teachers) attending schools in hinterland regions.
One issue that arises here has to do with whether, the incumbent administration, possessed of its petro resources, ought not to have made more headway in fixing this problem. Truth be told, it is taking an unacceptably protracted period to at least begin the process of bringing ‘flush’ toilets to schools in the hinterland. It should be said that what the Minister of Education had to say on this matter (Education Ministry surveying how many schools still have pit latrines: Stabroek News August 28, 2024) does not come even remotely close to getting to the core of it. Given the importance of replacing pit latrines with flush toilets, the process should have begun some time ago.
To go further, the fact that there appears not to have been, up to this time, some kind of concrete plan to incrementally remove pit latrines from schools in the interior does not reflect well on the Ministry of Education despite what the Minister of Education had to say in her interview with the Stabroek News about the education system having been decentralized so that, “as such schools are managed by the regional governance system.” One would not have thought that decentralization would have removed the vested interest of the Ministry to stay engaged with procedures and processes that have to do with the development of those facilities associated with the advancement of the education system.
One anticipates that questions will arise in some quarters as to whether there are not wider considerations associated with the installation of modern loos (the plural of loo, an informal British expression for toilet) including costs (which surely ought to be the lesser consideration) and technical/physical constraints (many of the locations where these pit latrines are situated are likely not to have access to ‘running’ water at this time) though the thought of these health hazards/actual danger to life and limb persisting for much longer is surely unthinkable and that whatever the costs (and effort) associated with upgrading, the exercise of removing and replacing these ‘pit latrines’ ought to be addressed with maximum alacrity.
It has to be said, further, that the functionaries responsible, directly, for delivering education in those areas where pit latrines are still ‘in vogue’ must commence the exercise of speaking out now that the issue is out in the open. In the circumstances, arriving at ‘a figure’ for the replacement of pit latrines ought not to be (as we say in Guyana) ‘a day’s work.’ The point to be made here is that the issue of pit latrines at hinterland schools is just the kind of revelation that might ‘blow over,’ after an initial ‘hoo-ha.’ This might well result in the issue of pit latrines becoming sidelined. After all, and for all the historic denial, issues to do with the well-being of hinterland communities have always appeared to be treated as lesser concerns. That is, at least, how it usually appears.
We should remind ourselves that we have only just had to endure a horrendous tragedy resulting from a fire in a Dormitory at an interior location that claimed a number of lives on account of what was widely felt to be, in large measure, a lack of official mindfulness in the matter of the safety of the children occupying the facility. In the extant instance of the pit latrines, as in the case of the Mahdia Dormitory Fire, it appears that the potential for tragedy that may range from the collapse of a pit latrine resulting in loss of life to outbreaks of pockets of diseases (if these may not have occurred already) may have an even more long-term harmful effect than the Mahdia Dorm Tragedy.
One assumes that, hopefully, the pit latrines ‘audit’ which, presumably would have been ensuing for some time and would have come to an end by now (on the surface, at least, it does not appear to be an overwhelmingly weighty task) and that the numbers are on the Minister’s desk. This, one feels, should be sufficient to cause the process leading to the installation of flush toilets at schools across the hinterland to begin without further undue delay.