Latest update December 4th, 2024 2:40 AM
Camp Groomes survivors still await word on meaningful compensation
By Zena Henry
Soldiers who survived the 2000 Camp Groomes explosion are still awaiting meaningful compensation from the Guyana Defence Force (GDF) for serious injuries sustained during the mishap that claimed the lives of three military men.
This is the 14th anniversary since the GDF ammunition bond exploded; injuring Samuel Archer, 35; Wendell Cort, 33; Calvin Lewis, 31; Curtis Samuels and several other ranks manning the Force’s three-storey weapons bond located just off the Soesdyke/Linden Highway.
The survivors had said that since their injuries in 2000, they had not received any meaningful compensation from the GDF. The army cut off the men’s $35,000 monthly salary last year.
Camp Groomes survivors: Lewis, Archer, Cort and Samuels.
The survivors related to the newspaper that the injuries sustained rendered them unable to work and according to the army, “medically unfit.” The survivors are unable to hold down any jobs due to the side effects of their injuries and they are surviving the best way they could.
The army explained last year that it was a “genuine mistake” that the men were removed from the army’s payroll, and vowed to earnestly take care of their own. The GDF said in the 2013 press statement that an initial decision was taken that “the persons injured in the Camp Groomes explosion would remain on strength, with pay until they attained the age of retirement.”
A more recent decision was “for the ranks to appear before a Medical Board and be discharged as ‘ceasing to fulfill medical standards’, so that they can begin to receive benefits without having to wait until they were at age 40, provided that the Defence Board agreed.”
According to the injured soldiers, this has not been fulfilled. Contact with Wendell Cort yesterday confirmed that the injured men have again been removed from the payroll and are finding it difficult to ascertain their financial status with the Force. Cort said that when he visited the army yesterday he was turned away.
Cort, like the other soldiers, had explained to Kaieteur News that that was the continuous response from the Force’s leaders when ascertaining compensation for the injuries they sustained in the line of duty. Former Chief of Staff, Rear Admiral Gary Best had assured the affected soldiers, that they would have been paid for the period that they were removed from the pay list.
The men said that they did receive various sums of money that were subjected to necessary deductions, “but meager by the time they received it.” They added that in June last year; the army told them that on December 31 last, they would cease to be on the payroll for “not fulfilling medical standards.”
The men were also told that “by time we come off (December 31), compensation will be fulfilled.” Instead, the newspaper was told, the soldiers have received no compensation and recieved no salary for last month. The men believe that they are “back to square one” where they feel like “we are begging them to help us after we were seriously injured on the job.”
The soldiers reiterated that since the mishap in 2000, “it was not until 2012 that we got to see a Chief of Staff; and that was after we stormed his office because they always telling us come back, he not available or sending us away.”
The soldiers are again requesting that the army make the necessary compensations and decisions fitting for ranks injured in the line of duty. To date, Cort says he still suffers with hearing problems, hallucinations and is physically weakened. Archer faces some of the same effects while, Samuels says he is physically weakened to the point where his family maintains him.
Lewis’ legs have not healed; they are infested with worms and still ooze inflammation.
The soldiers were asleep when the weapons bond exploded on December 18, 2000. They were part of a 14-man unit guarding the ammunition bond that housed hand grenades, various rifles, guns, booms and a suspected chemical weapon which the government stated, was destroyed at the time.
Similar Articles
THE BLUNT OF THE DAY
Sports
Features/Columnists
Deeply concerned about political dysfunction in society
Dear Editor The Guyana Trades Union Congress (GTUC) is deeply concerned about the political dysfunction in society that is... more
Haiti: Tragically Descending into Deeper Crisis
By Sir Ronald Sanders Kaieteur News- As gang violence spirals out of control in Haiti, the limitations of international... more
Weekend Cartoon
