The Environmental Protection Agency does not protect victims

May 28, 2017 Letters

Dear Editor,
Can one of the media house pay a visit to the sawmills on the Linden-Soesdyke Highway? There have been reports that some of the employees at one of the facilities were taken to the Georgetown Hospital this week after complaining of feeling as though they were being choked. I do not want to mention the name of the owner as it has been claimed that the owner has big connections in the Coalition Government.
I have been suffering at the hands of a neighboring sawmill for over two years, and to date the EPA of Guyana has been unable to bring an end to this problem.
I lodged complaints about loud noise all the time, but the EPA maintains that they cannot go by my account alone. The EPA maintains that they have to catch the saw-miller in the act of violation. This is very difficult because Guyana is known as one of the most corrupt countries in the region. Mysteriously the saw-miller would lower the noise moments before the EPA shows up. To complain about noise and dust earns you a very negative reputation in Guyana amongst the people at the EPA. They see you as someone who loves to complain.
It amazes me how the people who are employed at the EPA adhere to high standards in their offices. I have visited the EPA office at Prashad Nagar on several occasions, and I have been impressed with the working conditions there. They work in a nice clean environment with tidy air-conditioned offices. There are no supervisors pushing them – they work at their own pace.
There are coffee breaks and no restrictions as to how many cups of coffee a staff member is entitled to, and some drink quite often. When I first visited the EPA a few years ago the first thing that came to my mind was WHITE PEOPLE. Yes, the EPA staff work like White people. I would not even touch on the air-conditioned high-end vehicles they have access to. However, their performance and execution of their duties in the villages where violations are rampant show another face of Guyana. Our villages are similar to those civil war countries.
The other matter I would like to touch on is the NDC. In many villages all over Guyana, the NDCs no longer maintain the parapets and clear the drains. There are people who have been contracted by Central Government carry out these jobs that were previously done by the NDC. We all know that things were not well with many of the NDCs across Guyana, but to create parallel bodies to do the NDC’s functions is not the way forward, and I call on the media houses to look into this matter. Thieving and kickbacks still the order of the day.
Fazal Gafoor

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