Penelope (Penny) Howell is a trained teacher, and a community activist. Her husband Timothy is from Barbados. They are the proud parents of one son – Matthew Howell.
My grandfather, mother and all of her siblings were all born and raised at Coverden; from the Georgetown Hospital, I was transported straight home to Coverden right after birth. The river was the major source of transportation up and down the East Bank; my mom remembers waving to Princess Margaret at the Demerara River Bank in Coverden at her arrival, in 1958.
In those days visitors came through the Atkinson Aerodrome or the Base as it was commonly called, all passing through Coverden en route to Georgetown on the R.H.Carr which travelled between Georgetown and Wismar-Mackenzie.
My relatives recall all the tempestuous activities which led to the birth of Guyana from British Guiana, and of the thrill when they saw the lowering of the Union Jack, and the rising of the Golden Arrow Head, as they joined in singing Guyana’s brand new National Anthem for the first time. Back in those days, and even up to today, Coverden played its part in British Guiana, later Guyana’s development, as we have proudly produced a number of illustrious citizens for many areas of Guyana’s development.
I also remember spending my school vacations as a juvenile in this enchanted place called Coverden. Going to the Backdam; up to a certain “safe” point, as creepy stories of Bushmen, Moon-Gazers, Massacurra- Men and Fairmaids were rumored to be plentiful in the vegetation and waterways of Coverden. The fear of coming face to face with such strange creatures were greater than my curiosity, and was enough to keep every child within eye and ear shot of adults. Then there was the climbing of trees and the playing of an assortment of games: post to post; hop scotch; saul-out; kick-seed; chinese skipping; hide-and-seek; doll’s house, and the greatest of all, being allowed to swim with my older cousins. It seems that we were never allowed enough time in the trench, as we had to be called out several times, before we were eventually fished out of those therapeutic waters.
Then came nights, the most fearful part for little me, the time when I always cried to go back home to Georgetown with my parents – the six-o-clock bees, croaking frogs, and all those other strange animal sounds, that seemed to take great delight in scaring me. It was no fun at all, and, not to be outdone, the nocturnal “Jumbie-Stories” that were the evening’s staple, which seem to have a mesmeric pull, no matter how scared I was, every night – as I stayed around for the company of the others, more than for the fables told, then being too afraid to go to sleep afterwards. I cried to be allowed to go “home” every night; this request soon faded away at day light, as the cycle repeated itself, day after day.
I can still see my grandmother – Flora (Benjamin) Clarke and my aunts and some of the neighbors, downstairs, rain or sun, fingers all strapped, scraping and stripping macro, and weaving baskets of all sizes and shapes to be sold in Georgetown. Our grandmother had a pleasant but shy face, she always seemed to be pre-occupied with her thoughts, she was of indigenous descent, and always seemed ready to laugh at the slightest joke. She was also known as a firm disciplinarian too. I can still see her sharp eyes “warning” me every time I attempted to “overdo”. Our grandfather, Bertram Clarke, tied his waste tightly every morning, arming himself with a basket of farming paraphernalia including his cutlass, going off to work as an agronomist in the Backdaam, returning on evenings with plantain, bananas, eddoes, dasheen, breadnuts, coco pods, cashews (red, white and pink); mangoes, guava, psydium, pawpaw, oranges, lemons, soursop, monkey-apples, etc. Oh, how I would eat my fill of fruits, until I could eat no more, often in preference to whatever was cooked at mealtimes. My supreme dread was being “forced” to drink castor oil on some weekends. Even now, I still hate the smell of castor oil, as it gives me that nauseating feeling ………..still.
The time for “bush-cooks” was pulsating; getting the necessary ingredients from the kitchen undetected by adults was an art, honed after much practice by my older cousins. We the younger ones had the privilege of proudly doing the humble tasks, of gathering wood for the fire, fetching the water to be used, grating the coconuts, and washing the dishes afterwards, and only that much; the older cousins and their friends took over, and we the little ones were somewhat disappointed when we were shooed off “to go and play” until our help was needed again.
I remember the dilemma of being too young for the company of the older girls, and too grown up for the younger girls. Thus my most welcoming companions were the male cousins of my age, so I became an expert at playing marbles with awara and corrou seeds. My disenchantment came here too, as I was never selected for any sport team by any Captains, nor was I ever placed on the inside of the large truck tires when my cousins raced each other, no matter how much I begged, while another small male cousin enjoyed the ride from the inside of the tires during those races ….. being a girl had its disadvantage with the boys in those days.
Those were very delightful days, mixed with innocence, relatives, friends, lots of joy and laughter; jam-packed with living in the moment, day after day – during those effervescent school vacations; year after year. Later, some of my cousins migrated, our grandmother died, a decade later our grandfather died, one of my favorite aunts later died, and Coverden changed in my eyes. I became aware that I was no longer a child. I subsequently got my own family, and wanting to relive those exciting days at Coverden never left my subconsciousness. I decided to recreate that nostalgic experience for my offspring, by building our dream home at Coverden, in an effort to demonstrate that there is excitement and exhilaration away from electronic gadgets…and to a point this dream was realized. Our son would boast about going to the Backdaam, swimming in the trench, drinking black water, and having his fill of cousins to do all sorts of boyish, spontaneous activities within a safe and friendly environment.
Recently, many of us have been wondering if future generations shall ever have a taste of Coverden as we knew it, or is Coverden destined to now become one of the industrial dumps in Guyana?
Will Coverden be relegated to folklore and be used as a shorthand for might is right, for the power of money, and the exploitation of those wishing to maintain a simple way of life in harmony with the environment, by persons and high officials with little care for our collective health and welfare?
Will Coverden be allowed to continue to evolve into a natural eco-tourism destination, where overseas relatives, former residents, and their families and friends, can return unhampered to recreate those bygone days, of relaxing and the calming bliss, where they can reconstruct those bygone organic days, where the community lived in harmony with nature, away from the hustle and bustle of the materialistic world, while sampling the best that Guyana has to offer in the process?
How can this be? Why are we even here?
The Coverden that we knew and loved is slated for so-called “developmental change” by the powers-that-be; without any regard for standard due process, and without any proper or meaningful consultation with its residents, the caretakers of the community, those who have to live there and endure the consequences of decisions taken elsewhere and with no regard for their needs, desires, hopes.
We feel bulldozed into accepting a potentially hazardous ‘development’ in our midst which will have an impact on our lifestyle, while being told directly and indirectly, and most matter-of-factly, about all of the benefits of such a risky change.
Who could be happy to be sharing space with a Chemical Waste Treatment Plant to our immediate right, and a Radioactive Storage Plant at the entrance of your village? The Environmental Protection Agency approved the building of a chemical waste treatment plant in Coverden; even more shockingly, it waived any Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA), saying it was unnecessary. Would the powers-that-be who have signed away Coverden to this deal ever consider putting this in the communities where they and their families live? We know the answer to that question.
Consider the imprudence of such unwarranted developments:
Coverden is situated on the East Bank of the Demerara River which links with the two other major Berbice and Essequibo rivers.
Coverden is located just over 14 Km or 9 miles from the Cheddi Jagan International Airport, along the only road leading from the airport to our capital city, Georgetown, just imagine what could be the outcome, should there be a disaster of some sort, at any of these two Chemical Plants at any time?
Coverden is located just 13 km or 8 miles away from the junction of the Soesdyke- Linden Highway, the only road leading to this junction to Region 10, from Georgetown
The East Bank Public Road is the only paved road at Coverden and a number of adjoining villages along the way depend on this roadway to conduct their everyday businesses.
The proposed Waste Treatment and the Radioactive Storage Plants will also be served by the same and only roadway, along this stretch, which are sure environmental disasters to our natural flora and fauna should something go wrong by way of natural or environmental disaster, or human error.
Reflecting on the above, the following questions came to mind:
Has the discovery of Oil and Gas been a blessing to Guyana and Guyanese, or will these foreign companies milk our resources dry, and leave us behind when we have no more to give, to clean up after them, as has been the experience of other nations?
Will any of the income realized from the Oil and Gas Industry be equitably distributed to all Guyanese, or shall the economically rich get richer, while the underprivileged just keep getting poorer socially, economically, environmentally and culturally?
Shall we allow wealthy powerful companies to plunder our natural resources for their material gain, while we lose our heritage and way of life in the process, despite our protest to the contrary?
Are Guyanese going to become second class citizens again, so many years after independence, as our words and wishes seem to have no weight whatsoever, since nothing we say or do is taken seriously by those who should know better?
Whose interest should come first? Guyanese or the foreign dollar?
Shockingly, the residents of Coverden were officially informed that the Waste Chemical Treatment Plant was approved and given the go ahead to begin operations at Coverden in the near future. This demonstrates that our objections were of no avail, and that we are being taken for granted and ignored, as the decision to destroy our village was already a promised deal, that the lives and livelihoods of Guyanese are placed somewhere down at the bottom of the list of priorities in preference to Non-Guyanese, who would never be allowed to commit such atrocities in their own homelands abroad.
