Ten days before the catastrophic sinking of the MV Barima there was another signal event that drew a line under a gruesome double murder that frayed the fabric of society and led to riots.
Nearly six years after the brutal killings of cousins Isaiah Henry, 16, and Joel Henry, 19, convulsed the country, Anil Sancharra and Vinod Gopaul were on July 8th sentenced to life imprisonment at the Berbice Assizes.
Justice Simone Morris ordered that both men serve 35 years before becoming eligible for parole. On June 9, a High Court jury in Berbice had unanimously found Sancharra and Gopaul guilty on two counts of murder. The verdicts were returned after more than two hours of deliberations.
From the evidence presented to the court Sancharra and Gopaul had maintained a marijuana farm at the Cotton Tree backlands on the West Coast of Berbice. On visiting the area on September 6, 2020 they discovered that their crop had been damaged. The Henry cousins approached during discussions about the destruction and an exchange followed after which the boys were heinously murdered by Sancharra and Gopaul and their bodies mutilated.
These barbaric killings naturally attracted an outpouring of grief and rage. Answers needed to be provided by the authorities speedily but this was not the case. In the vacuum created by the unresponsiveness of the authorities. Mayhem erupted at various parts of the West Berbice. Tyres were set alight on the road, people were beaten and robbed, vehicles lit afire and in the most horrific consequence, another young man, Haresh Singh was killed in what was thought to be a reprisal.
How did the country arrive at that point? While the community anger and sorrow were to be expected these were prospected on and fuelled by various entrepreneurs who had no concern at all for the stability of the country and peace and calm.
It would be remembered that the killings of the Henry boys occurred just around a month after the five-month struggle to overturn the rigging of the March 2020 general election. In that atmosphere it was clear that political provocateurs went to work by insinuating all manner of reasons for the deaths of the Henry boys. In that milieu it was easy for violence to spiral out control as it did. A number of people were beaten at points where the road was blocked during the unrest and others had to flee. This blocking of the road happened on several occasions. In the worst possible outcome Haresh Singh was killed and there were other flare-ups with an ethno-political tinge.
While political types clearly helped to fuel the mayhem that had engulfed the road on several occasions, the tide turned against this violence on September 9th when then Chair of the People’s National Congress Reform (PNCR) Volda Lawrence called on those protesting the murders of Joel and Isaiah Henry to desist from creating carnage.
During a live video shared on Facebook, the former Minister of Health, acknowledged that in the days that followed the murders the country had been gripped by anger, vexation and hurt.
She pointed out that the gruesome and barbaric way in which the boys were killed had rightly led to calls for the authorities to act but she called on any supporters of her party who might be part of violent actions to desist.
“What I have seen I cannot as a leader condone…We are hurting each other as a people, we are hurting each other as neighbours and friends and we are turning on each other as though we don’t know each other and as a Leader, we have to call a spade a spade,” Ms Lawrence said while visiting Hopetown.
Noting that she had just learnt of the death of 17-year-old Haresh Singh, the party leader offered condolences to his family while declaring that Guyanese do not kill children.
“We’re not a people who kill our children, we’re not a people who maim each other, we’re not barbarians, we’re Guyanese,” Ms Lawrence said.
“We’re asking for justice, we’re also asking for peace, pull away the things from in the middle of the road, we can do things differently, we can send our message differently…it doesn’t mean we are weak…We certainly can display our grief in a different manner…Stop, stop, this is hurting us…this will not solve our problems, our problems will get deeper; it will get wider and we still will not solve it,” she implored. This was the presentation of a responsible politician even as others had pitched fuel on the flames.
What had been originally cast as murders with sinister connections were eventually presented to the court with sufficient evidence by the police for prosecutors to secure convictions. If there is any criticism that should be levelled at the police force in this matter it relates to the length of time it took for the investigation to zero in on the likely motive. The Henry boys were killed on September 6th, 2020. It was not until January 15, 2021 that charges were brought against the two men who were eventually convicted of the crime. In the intervening four months the society faced grave danger from those who sought to transform the deep anger and grief of those on the West Coast Berbice into a political confrontation. A clear lesson must be drawn from this.
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