Mass school hysteria spreads across Guyana

Nov 07, 2009 News

(By Mondale Smith and Jenelle Carter)

The scene in Form 3C yesterday at the East Ruimveldt Secondary School. It has been in this state where bags and books were left abandoned after mass hysteria broke out Thursday.

Yesterday, East Ruimveldt Secondary School, according to head teacher, Maureen Samuels, was supposed to have been one for regular schooling but from the students and some teachers’ perspectives it was the total opposite.
The student population is just about 600 but only about 50 turned up in uniform while a sprinkling sported casuals. Most were in no frame of mind for work or to be taught. Some of those who turned up entered classrooms briefly for chit chat and reflections but none dared venture near or into form 3C on the upper floor. That is the room in which mass hysteria broke out on Thursday prompting talk of demon possessions.
Some arrived at the school but never entered the compound and speculations and fears remained rife of demon possession.
However, several parents did turn up at the school. One woman said, “Me ain’t send me daughter today because me ain’t want no spirits tek she over but I come to see what happening today (yesterday),” one mother told this publication.
Another woman said she’s giving the school a few days to get its house in order or she will be opting for a transfer for her daughter. One of the girls who was among the lot of 15 who became hysterical, was seen in the school compound and her fellow students quizzed her from a distance before someone pronounced that, “Ya’ll ain’t see that girl aint looking right…Lef she alone.”

While prayer has not been part of school life for several years, yesterday these students were seen reading their bibles on the East Ruimveldt Secondary school steps.

Though prayer and bible reading is not a regular practice at the institution, yesterday most of the children reported for classes with Bibles and New Testaments in hand. Some were seen reading scripture verses aloud to one another in and outside the school building while others openly expressed that they were not fearful of any supernatural being except God.
They were however worried for their peers. One of the pastors who was engaged in praying for the deliverance of the girls amidst their loud shrieks, screams and tantrums one day earlier was seen yesterday in the class room praying loudly. He also armed himself with a bucket containing a sweet-smelling liquid and mopped the room.
On Thursday pandemonium broke out at the school after one female student went berserk allegedly under some supernatural influence. That hysteria quickly spread to 14 other female students resulting in most tearing off their clothing and behaving abnormal.
Some bellowed to the top of their lungs while others displayed a mad fit of giggling. Pastors and religious leaders were called in and got to work praying and shouting “get out in the name of Jesus.”
Strange occurrence at Bartica Secondary School
Yesterday too the strange occurrence that unfolded at the East Ruimveldt Secondary one day earlier, reportedly happened to several students at the Bartica Secondary School. Reports are that nine students of that school in Region Seven were ‘attacked by something supernatural’.
This newspaper was told that earlier in the day some female students went into the school’s washroom where they saw ‘something’.
Upon returning to their classrooms they said nothing, then shortly after, one female began behaving in an unusual manner. After lunch several other girls followed and mass hysteria began at that school.
The teacher said that the children, all second and third form students, on their return to school, began recounting the morning’s event then the others began to behave in the strange manner.
In the end, nine students succumbed and by late yesterday, six of them were at the Line House Assemblies of God Church.
Reports are that most of the people in the community came out to witness the unusual scene which caused panic and classes were immediately suspended until further notice.
Meanwhile, the head teacher of the school said that on Monday a mass prayer service will be held at the school.
Last evening too it was reported that students at a school in Essequibo had several of the same experiences yesterday.
And by evening, there were reports of a similar occurrence at the Charity Secondary School.