I hope President Ramotar will remember to fulfill his promise
DEAR EDITOR,
Sometime in February 2015, I was watching my TV when I was lucky to catch a live call-in programme on a local channel featuring our President, Mr Donald Ramotar, a person whom I always admire for his humility and honesty, and along with him, Mr Seeraj from the RPA. During this programme, a female called in to complain about the loud music emanating from two popular discos, especially on Mondays, causing great discomfort and annoyance to the residents of Charity and to a greater extent, the Catholic Church and the hospital. This woman’s complaint could not be more true, as I could attest through this letter that I as a Catholic had this experience with the noise from these discos. Because of this noise, the priests of the Catholic Church cannot perform their duties in a place of tranquility and more so have proper evening classes with the children staying at the Catholic dormitory. The priest of this church has made several complaints to the Charity Police Station which I am sure are recorded. The President’s answer to the female caller was that he would have discussed this matter with the Divisional Commander, and himself and Mr Seeraj publicly said that residents have a constitutional right to enjoy the peace, tranquility and comfort of their surroundings. My reason for this letter is because it seems that the President has forgotten his promise when he walked out of the TV studio, because up to this day this nuisance has continued unabated, compliments of the Charity Police Station. There are two questions to this matter: Could it be that the proprietors of these places have high political connections and/or maybe in the Guyana Police Force, making them a part of the untouchables in Guyana. The Easter Monday holiday is coming up, and this is a day when the volume of the music increases ten-fold, without any intervention by the police to curb the noise. I feel, like many others in Guyana, that strong laws and systems should be legislated on noise pollution to protect the people, especially the sick, the elderly and the school children from this scourge in our society, not forgetting places of worship and hospitals. I would like to share this thought in this letter for the ruling politicians to ponder on. You could have two super rich friends go into a polling booth with two bags full of cash, but what counts are only their thumb prints, and twenty poor persons with no cash against you going into that booth are more powerful than your two friends. I hope President Ramotar will have an opportunity to read this letter and remember to fulfill his promise.
Member of the Catholic fraternity