Student beat, rip off hijab, and attempt to strip 5th form school mate - Parent not satisfied with school's intervention

Student beat, rip off hijab, and attempt to strip 5th form school mate — Parent not satisfied with school’s intervention

Oct 20, 2019 News

“I was embarrassed and bullied”, said the fifth form student of the Tagore Memorial Secondary School at Number 66 Village, Upper Corentyne, Berbice after she was beaten and had her religious attire (hijab) ripped off her head.

Ibra him showing a blood shot eye after she was attacked.

According to the teen, on Monday she was a victim of extreme bullying by a group of girls attending her school. The incident was caught on camera and the teen’s mother, Rosanna Mohamed, has since filed a police report at the Springlands Police Station.
She said that she was not satisfied with the manner in which the school handled the matter.
Sustaining a blood shot eye, headache, and pain to the neck, arms, back and torso is 15-year-old Sakeena Ibrahim, of Corriverton, Berbice.
She told Kaieteur News that it was during recess on Monday at the Tagore Memorial Secondary School that a female third form student walked up to her and asked her, “Why you call ‘Ashley’ (her friend) a hoe?”. The teen said she relayed to the female that she did not do such a thing but the third former told her “We will see you at lunch”.
She explained, “We were on the grandstand eating lunch when the third former showed up with a fourth former (name provided) and she was questioning me about the same thing she asked me during recess.
“Then she started pointing up her fingers in my face telling me to do something and I told her it is between me and the (4th former) and we can talk about it.
“Then she told the (4th former) to do something and then she came and squeezed a box of juice in my face. I had to take off my glasses. I retaliated and throw back drinks on her and then she scrambled me and that is where the fight started.”
In the video seen by this publication the fourth former was seen tugging on Ibrahim’s hair after she had ripped off the teen’s hijab from her head. She was seen dealing several cuffs to the head, arms, abdomen and back of the teen.
At one point the junior attempted to strip the teen of her school uniform. While the assault was taking place students could be heard in the background of the video shouting “kill her”.
According to the still traumatized Ibrahim, she was stripped of her dignity when her religious attire was snatched off and she was “embarrassed and bullied”. She added that after the incident her eyes began to bleed and at that point, with a friend, she decided to inform the teacher.
However, she was left baffled after she was told by the teacher not to inform her mother about the incident.
“It was my friend that had to call my mom and then the teacher took me up to the HM office with the other girls.”
She said that the two girls who committed the act were only suspended for three days following the incident but for her and her mother, it is not enough since she is still being bullied verbally by the teens and other students who saw the incident on video.
Ibrahim told this publication that since the incident she has thought about committing suicide as an option to remove the embarrassment she faced but it is her mother who has helped her to cope and remove such thoughts from her.
She added that it is very difficult for her to focus on her studies when the entire school seems to find the incident “a laughing matter”.
She suggested having the girls removed from the school and offered counselling since it is not the first time that the said girls have bullied a student.
“I have seen this happen a lot of times before as a student here and nobody does anything.”
Meanwhile, the mother of the humiliated teen, Rosanna Mohamed, a teacher at the Tagore Nursery School, said that on Wednesday a report was filed at the police station but when the police invited the headmistress to visit the Springlands Station the HM reportedly told them that the Welfare Department prohibited her from going.
“When we contacted the Welfare Department they said they didn’t stop the HM so she just did not want to go.”
She opined that having the girls suspended is not good enough.
“You are basically telling these students that it is okay to beat people and still be in school. This is my child and I see other people’s children being bullied. I am not going to stand for my daughter alone. I am going to stand for everybody else.
“it’s one daughter I have and if something more serious had happened to her I would have been the one to lose the child.”