Alarm at the targeting of farming community by bandits

Dear Editor,
The Guyana Rice Producers Association (RPA) is outraged at the wave of attacks targeting the farming community generally, and the rice farmers specifically.
The first assault on rice farmers was the reneging by the government of a multiplicity of pre-election promises, which is now perceived as a ploy to win the votes of the farming community.
This was followed by the scandalous imbroglio of sole sourcing of fertiliser, using the farmers’ own money, as a payoff for political favours.
Then, seemingly in efforts to decelerate the unprecedented strides the industry has been making during the last administration, the Government rescinded the former Government’s waiver of VAT for heavy-duty capital equipment and imposed on the millers increased licencing fees for mills, costs which redounded to the beleaguered rice farmers.

Correspondingly and simultaneously, a wave of murderous attacks by the criminal fraternity has been launched against the populace, but seemingly especially targeting farmers, with rice farmers bearing the brunt of these attacks. This has implanted in the minds of farmers that they are being singled out for extermination in a bid to subsume the rice industry in particular, and the agricultural sector in general, in the national socio-economic demographics.
Rice farmers are a hard-working and hardy lot and they have sustained Guyana’s food security for generations.
The Munirs are no exception. Like most members of the farming community they worked since their childhood to better their circumstances and today, when they should be enjoying the fruits of their laborious life and great sacrifices they have been deprived of their lives in the most brutal fashion – being burnt alive with no hope of help, in their own home by psychopathic predators who feel entitled to wrest by force the fruits of the hard work of others.
The RPA family is mourning this great and tragic loss in their rice-farming community, especially the most brutal manner in the way this helpless elderly couple, who had barricaded themselves in a strong room for protection, were set ablaze by the beasts intent on murder.
It is public knowledge that the Munirs never kept money or any valuables in their home, and it is being conjectured that some motivation other than robbery is driving the crime-wave targeting this particular community across the country.
The RPA demands that the Security Minister take urgent and committed steps to find the perpetrators and protect the farming community and general populace from such murderous attacks in their own homes, and in the society at large.
On my own behalf, and on behalf of the RPA family, we extend condolences and express outrage of this heinous act in support of the Munir family.

Sincerely,
Dharamkumar Seeraj
General-Secretary
RPA