Speaking at Port Kaituma yesterday in his first engagement with survivors and the relatives of those missing from Saturday’s capsizing of MV Barima, President Ali described what had occurred as “a tragedy of immense proportions.”
It is indeed that and beyond. Twenty-seven bodies have been pulled from the Atlantic and another 83 persons are missing and must be presumed dead. It means that this single tragedy might have claimed over 100 lives. This is unprecedented in the country’s travails as a nation. The grief and pain is palpable in dozens of families in north west communities as exemplified in the case of Elena Moonsammy who told Kiskadee Watch that she feared she had lost seven of her young relatives. Their loss is incalculable and irreversible.
Were this death toll the result of a force of nature as the earthquakes that shook La Guaira in Venezuela in June and claimed thousands of lives one could have given leeway, without any reservation, to the government to expend its energies in life-saving, recovery, counselling and repair. That cannot be the case at Iron Punt in the Atlantic Ocean off of the Pomeroon River.
Three days after the catastrophe there can be no refuting of the unmistakable human errors, mismanagement, negligence and misbehavior that caused this calamity. The waters at Iron Punt were no doubt ferocious but have been routinely navigated by ferries motoring up to the northwest. There has never been an incident of this scale and in the aftermath of what occurred on Saturday night accountability must begin immediately.
Enough is known to set this process in train. After asserting first that the number of passengers and crew aboard was 116 and then 133, the government has conceded that there may have been as many as 46 more people who were on the vessel but not registered on the ferry’s manifest.
Second, from the many accounts of survivors the ferry was laden to capacity and beyond with crates, boxes, generators and other items in every conceivable part of the vessel. When confronted by a formidable wave on Saturday night, the ferry tilted and capsized as cargo rolled in the direction of the force that had been unleashed.
Prior to the described wave, there had been an assortment of reports about engine problems, leaks on this vessel and the taking on of water. Major work had been commissioned for this vessel including for its hull but not yet done. This ferry was at least 87 years old and had no right to still be in the service of oil rich Guyana.
Third, after multiple accounts from survivors about the misbehaviour of crew members the government has confirmed that the captain and at least one other senior crew member had tested positive for a narcotic. Other crew members had been accused of consuming alcohol.
Taken all together these occurrences are indictments of the Transport and Harbours Department (T&HD), the Maritime Administration Department (MARAD), the Ministry of Public Works and the wider government. It cannot be business as usual. This is a government that keenly scouts for every opening to apportion blame everywhere else but where it must be assigned. In this instance, given the fact that he has presided over the Ministry of Public Works imperiously for the last six years, Minister Juan Edghill must be held accountable for the failings of the T&HD and MARAD which triggered this expanding disaster.
Given what he had become aware of early on he should have already done the honourable thing by resigning from office to enable an unimpeded investigation and broader inquiry into what has transpired. He has not departed for two reasons. There has never been a culture of ministerial accountability in PPP/C governments post 1992 and Minister Edghill perceives that he is of great political value to the government and he is therefore safe from removal by President Ali. That calculus in these circumstances is utterly unacceptable. Minister Edghill must resign to clear the way for a full investigation and if he fails to do this then President Ali must act with celerity and clarity.
Since the electoral crisis of 2020 that delayed its assumption of the reins of government for five months, the PPP/C and its leaders have been consumed with the singular intent to run the country in the mould they have created no matter the corruption that is evident or the malign conduct of its senior officials. It has closed space to civil society and sidelined the opposition to the extent that at this juncture of the tragedy of “immense proportions” cited by President Ali there has been no engagement between him and the Leader of the Opposition and the broader opposition.
The PPP/C has thus cut itself off from any broader redoubt of goodwill and combined energies to address this horrific loss of life and to help the country to heal. It has no one but itself to blame. Were there a properly functioning parliamentary democracy an emergency session would have been convened as early as Sunday or Monday to examine what had transpired. There would have also been mobilisation countrywide of all types of support. Instead, it has been the government and its handmaidens in the private sector with no adequate search and rescue so as to leave the survivors of this tragedy treading water for hours. The government then had the gumption to claim as a triumph the discovery of the wreckage of MV Barima when it was efforts of an intrepid fisherman who led them to the area notwithstanding the fact that Georgetown supposedly had an all-in relationship wth Washington that should have been mobilized on Saturday night. It has been a shabby performance but quite in character from the state and its various arms and the toll has fallen on the ordinary people of this country. If time is a judge, just as in the aftermath of the Mahdia tragedy of 2023, the government will hope to resume normal service soon and leave the wounded and the bereft to their own devices. We hope that will not be the case here and that humility and contrition will be shown and that the government will open up lines of communication that it has steadfastly ignored.
A credible Commission of Inquiry has to be established with persons of repute who are not under the thrall of the presidency. But first Minister Edghill must go.
Discussion