A meeting that was planned for yesterday by residents of Santa Rosa on a proper sanitary block for their school was postponed to Monday after the Minister of Education said he was unable to attend.
The sanitary block has been a burning issue for Santa Rose since nine-year-old Tenesha De Souza lost her life after falling into a pit latrine at the school.
Chairman of the Parent-Teachers Association (PTA) Mark Atkinson on Thursday told Stabroek News that he received a call from Minister Shaik Baksh early that morning and was informed that he was unable to attend the planned meeting.
A disappointed Atkinson said that when the news was relayed to the rest of the community, most of whom were under the impression that the minister would have attended, they all expressed disappointment as they felt that the matter was important enough to warrant his presence. Atkinson said that the community is “upset that the minister is not coming.” He said because the minister could not attend the meeting they pushed it back to Monday even though the minister would still not be attending.
According to Atkinson the minister told him that his ministry cannot make any donation towards the building of the sanitary block until next year when they get their budgetary allocation. In turn, he said he informed the minister that they cannot wait until next year’s budget to build a sanitary block for the children as they are concerned for their well-being at present. He said the minister then told him to go ahead and accept donations and let the PTA build the sanitary block.
“But they [the ministry] is supposed to help us and the minister said he was too busy to attend the meeting,” Atkinson said.
Baksh at a recent press conference had stated that $1 million was donated to the school under the Education For All-Fast Track Initiative Programme (EFA-FTI) to be used to build additional classrooms and a sanitary block. Atkinson has since said that the money is woefully inadequate to build a proper sanitary block for the children.
Tenesha’s father, Marlon De Souza, also speaking to Stabroek News on Thursday expressed disappointment over the minister’s unavailability to attend the meeting. “I can’t describe how I feel right now, it is like we are being left out, Santa Rosa is being left out, we are showing concern and nobody else showing concern,” he said.
A committee member of the PTA, Arnold James, also speaking to Stabroek News said that the community expected the minister to visit the area and they were all disappointed that he indicated his inability to attend. “We are really kind of frustrated and we have to find a way to go ahead and build the toilets, we need to do something,” the man said. “We need to get people in a positive mood, we are trying to get the sand into the school compound, it is hard but we are trying and we would work towards building the toilets,” he said.
Atkinson said that while they have some sand they need some more and according to him some business persons have promised to assist them and he hopes they would keep their promise. He said he also received a call from someone in England who indicated their willingness to help. The chairman appealed to the public at large to assist the school in building the sanitary block as they do not want any other child to suffer the same fate as Tenesha.
The PTA has already received a donation of some toilet bowls and plumbing material from the Alliance For Change (AFC) and Atkinson said they plan to use these when building the sanitary block. When the AFC had announced its intention to make the donation Minister Baksh had said they could not make the donation unless they got permission. However, the AFC donated the items to the PTA and not the school, and they were accepted by Atkinson and other parents.
At Monday’s meeting Atkinson said he would depend on the residents to tell him what is the way forward as he feels they need a forum to make their voices heard.
