Dear Editor,
I write to applaud The Caribbean Voice (TCV) for its social welfare, activism, and educational programmes that benefit all Guyanese. Without its social programmes, Guyana would be worse off today. TCV has done very much to educate Guyanese about social ills and combat problems affecting the population.
Among its programmes are:
The Youth and Student Workshop to mostly private schools and youth groups. This workshop is endorsed by the Ministry of Education (MoE), which also indicated that it would be made part of the Health and Family Life Education curriculum in schools. Public schools are not being serviced by this workshop, because permission is needed from the Ministry of Education, although a number of public schools have requested it.
A Teacher Training Workshop, to provide teachers with skills and the capacity to develop their own mental toughness, to be able to deal with emotional and psychological problems their students face, and to arm their students with positive self-esteem and coping skills. This, too, has been endorsed by the Ministry of Education, which has offered to collaborate and get schools’ welfare workers involved in its implementation.
A Train-the-Trainer Workshop, which trains others to become trainers for gatekeepers and to turnkey their training to their various communities and the entities with which they are associated.
An Employee Mental Health Workshop, which helps workers at various companies to be able to deal with stress and challenges, and emotional and psychological issues.
A Community Outreach, launched in 2014 at Black Bush Polder and since taken to a number of communities, often in collaboration with other NGOs, community-based organizations and/or faith-based organizations.
TCV has media advocacy and information dissemination campaigns on combating various social ills ongoing. In addition to constant letters and articles published both in the local and diaspora media, TCV has had meetings with some of the media houses in Guyana.
TCV’s messages are able to reach Guyanese in all three counties via both radio and TV. Caribbean Voice lobbying efforts are also ongoing as it strives to achieve the following: to persuade the Government to place counsellors in all schools in Guyana; to integrate mental health care into the current physical health care system; to establish psych wards in all public hospitals throughout Guyana; to station clinical counsellors at every hospital; to engage in widespread sensitivity training for police officers with respect to suicide and abuse – child, sexual and gender-based, as well as mental health issues in general; to raise the age of consent from 16 years to 18 years; to decriminalize attempted suicide; to widely and continually publicize and promote the suicide hotline, and to include Hindu and Muslim priests in the roster that handle calls and follow-up; to set up a support network for women who want to opt out of abusive relationships; piggy back self-esteem and coping skills in all training programmes across Guyana; move collaboration with all stakeholders from rhetoric to concrete practice; implement the Shri Lanka Hazard Reduction Model (or something similar) to tackle pesticide suicide; give teeth to the Sexual Offences Act.
The Voice currently has an online petition calling for Government to establish a registry of sex offenders. The petition can be accessed at https://www.change.org/p/president-of-the-republic-of-guyana-establish-a-registry-for-all-sex-offenders.
TCV is appealing to the media to help publicize the petition, and to Guyanese to support it by logging online, signing and sharing. Printed signatures are also being sought.
Yours truly,
Vishnu Bisram
