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Anti-COVID-19 vaccination protest escalates in Linden
– Mackenzie/Wismar Bridge blocked, minibuses en route to interior locations affected
By Vanessa Braithwaite
Minibuses with passengers en route to interior locations were also affected by yesterday’s protest.
Kaieteur News – Yesterday Lindeners came out in their numbers to join frontline health workers who were locked out of healthcare facilities across the Region. This is the second day the ‘no vaccine, no entry policy’, has been enforced and residents have joined the healthcare workers who were denied access to their place of employment for failure to produce a COVID-19 vaccination card. The irate protestors assembled first at the Linden Hospital Complex where they were addressed by Members of Parliament Jermaine Figueira and Devin Sears. The two MPs who were both vaccinated, collectively stressed that they are not against the vaccination campaign, but against mandatory vaccination imposition and moves to deny frontline workers their right to access their place of work. “You are standing for your rights, you are standing for justice, you have been on the frontline serving this community without vaccine, putting your lives at risk every single day for the residents of this community and here you are denied access to your place of employment,” MP Figueira said.
The protest action then moved to the centennial arch where scores of residents blocked traffic from the Mackenzie shore. They chanted, ‘my body, my Choice’, ‘no mandatory vaccine’, ‘we have a right to choose’ and ‘open the gate let the nurses come in’. At this point there was heavy police presence on the Mackenzie/Wismar Bridge and Commander of Region 10, Hugh Winter, urged residents to desist from blocking the road and obstructing the flow of traffic. Winter, using a loud speaker, said, “when you are picketing you cannot block the road, you can protest but please go into the corner and allow the traffic to flow.”
Another set of protestors were successful in completely blocking traffic from the Wismar shore. Only motorcycles and bicycles were allowed to pass until protestors decided to form a human barricade to place large items such as wood and steel to block the bridge. On the Wismar shore too, there was a pregnant woman who was panting for breath while in traffic but despite appeals from the police force for the protestors to clear the road, they refused, insisting that they prefer to “fetch her over, than to allow the car to pass.”
Also minibuses en route to Mahdia, Lethem and other interior locations were not allowed to pass the bridge, which up to press time, was still blocked by the residents.
Scenes from yesterday’s protest.
As they chanted loudly and waved their placards, the protestors were joined by former Member of Parliament, Vanessa Kissoon. The Regional Chairman, Deron Adams, also stood in solidarity with them and reiterated that he is against mandatory vaccination. “While I am concerned about your safety, I am also saying plain, that vaccine should never be made mandatory. What I also want to say to you is that, I believe it is a sinister plot behind this action, you know that under the previous government, the feasibility study was started for the road to Linden to Lethem to commence, that project is before the IDB to commence. There is a specific word that this government is aware of, that speaks to stability in the region, for that project to be executed, to bring economic activity to our region. The reason why we believe they have been pressuring Region 10 and Linden is because they are attempting to destabilise the region to pull that project that will bring economic activity to the region,” he said.
In an invited comment, Regional Health Officer, Dr. Gregory Harris, said that following concerns that the Upper-Demerara Hospital, which is the COVID-Unit, has been locked. As such he reached out to the doctor-in-charge to ensure that the facility remains accessible to persons seeking COVID-19 testing on the basis of contact tracing. Relative to the functioning of health centres across the region, the two that were mainly affected were the Christianburg Health Centre and the One Mile Health Centre.
In Linden, which has a low vaccine uptake, and across the country, a mandatory vaccine imposition has been enforced at all government agencies.
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